LIBRARY  OF  PRINCETON 


JAN  ~  7  2003 


THEOLOGICAL  SE^^!NARY 


BR151  .S34  1854 
Scenes  from  Christian 
history. 


\/ 


SCENE 


\m  24  1327 


<?^' 


FBOU 


CHRISTIAN   HISTORY. 


FIFTH  EDITION. 


BOSTON : 
CROSBY,    NICHOLS,    AND    CO]\*PANY. 

NEW    YORK: 
CHARLES  S.  FRANCIS  AND  COMPANY 

1854. 


Entered  according  to  Act  oi  c-ongress,  in  the  year  1852,  by 

William  Ckosb^, 

In  the  Clerk'a  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts , 


CAMBRIDGE: 

STEREOTYPED   AND    PRINTED    BT 

METCALF     AND     COMPANY, 

PRINTERS    TO    THE    UNIVERSITY. 


GENERAL  DIRECTIONS 


In  this  course  of  Christian  instruction,  there  are 
eight  text-books,  bearing  the  following  titles  :  —  Ear- 
ly Religious  Lessons ;  Palestine  and  the  Hebrew 
People  ;  Lessons  on  the  Old  Testament ;  Life  of 
Christ ;  Books  and  Characters  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment ;  Religious  Duties  and  Christian  Morals ;  Doc- 
trines of  Scripture  ;  Scenes  from  Christian  History. 

The  first  of  these  is  designed  to  be  used  —  though 
not  to  the  entire  exclusion  of  other  text-books  for 
that  period  —  by  all  pupils  under  ten  years  of  age. 
As  children  enter  the  Sunday  School  at  different 
ages,  it  seems  necessary  to  leave  them,  up  to  a  cer- 
tain period,  without  a  very  rigidly  determined  order 
of  instruction,  and  more  than  afterwards  under  the 
direction  of  the  individual  preferences  and  judg- 
ments of  their  teachers,  in  regard  to  their  methods 
of  study.  The  first  manual,  consisting  of  selected 
passages  of  Scripture  and  simp!# illustrative  verses, 


IV 

is  offered  to  these  teachers  as  an  aid  to  their  work. 
The  object  here  is  not  so  much  connection  between 
the  parts,  as  to  fasten  in  the  child's  mind  certain 
sacred  words  and  truths,  fraught  with  hallowed  asso- 
ciations, which  may  prove  a  treasury  of  comfort  and 
suggest  themes  of  devout  meditation  through  the 
whole  of  life.  Each  exercise  is  to  ie  thoroughly 
fixed  in  the  pupiVs  memory.  It  may  then  be  ex- 
plained and  illustrated,  according  to  the  teacher's 
pleasure  or  opportunity. 

At  the  beginning  of  each  school  year,  all  the  pu- 
pils within  the  school,  that  have  arrived  at  the  age  of 
ten  within  the  year  preceding,  are  to  be  arranged 
in  classes  of  convenient  size,  and  to  be  occupied 
one  school  year  —  not  more  nor  less  —  with  Manual 
No.  2,  —  "  Palestine  and  the  Hebrew  People." 

All  pupils  that  have  become  eleven  years  old 
within  the  year  preceding,  are  to  study  for  one  year 
Manual  No.  3.  No.  4  is  for  scholars  between  the 
ages  of  twelve  and  thirteen.  No.  5  is  for  those 
between  thirteen  and  fourteen.  No.  6  is  for  those 
between  fourteen  and  fifteen.  No.  7  is  for  those 
between  fifteen  and  sixteen.  No.  8  is  for  those  be- 
tween sixteen  and  seventeen. 

The  order  of  succession  in  the  subjects  of  study 
will  be  observed,  and  the  obvious  reasons  that  pre- 
scribe  it.     The  siffcess  of  the  plan,  in  any  given 


school,  will  probably  depend  much  on  a  strict  adher- 
ence to  this  system. 

Most  of  the  text-books  contain  only  about  thirty 
lessons  each.  Room  is  thus  provided  for  the  vaca- 
tion that  is  introduced  into  some  Sunday  Schools, 
for  unavoidable  interruptions  within  the  year,  and 
for  a  review  of  the  book. 

The  lessons  are  of  such  length  that  they  may  be 
fully  recited  in  about  half  an  hour  ;  and,  to  do  them 
justice,  not  less  than  that  amount  of  time  should  be 
left  free  from  all  other  occupation  in  every  Sunday 
School  exercise. 

The  design  is  that  each  subject,  in  the  order,  shall 
be  thus  thoroughly  mastered  and  understood  by  the 
class ;  that,  at  the  close  of  the  year,  they  may  be  as 
well  fitted  for  examination  in  it,  as  the  classes  of  our 
common  schools  are  in  their  several  branches  of 
study.  It  is  earnestly  recommended  to  parents, 
teachers,  and  pastors,  that  they  require  of  the  young 
committed  to  their  charge,  and  pursuing  this  course, 
so  much  time  and  application  as  will  accomplish 
this  end.  The  result,  to  say  nothing  of  spiritual 
impressions,  would  be  the  possession  of  a  body  of 
Christian  information  of  the  utmost  value,  and  such 
as  no  youth  can  remain  ignorant  of,  in  a  commu- 
nity like  ours,  without  cause  for  deep  reproach. 

The  names  of  the  writers,  arranged  alphabetical- 
1* 


VI 


ly,  and  not  according  to  the  order  of  the  books  in 
the  course,  are  as  follows  :  — 

Rev.  Geo.  W.  Briggs, 

"        S.    G.    BULFINCH, 

.  "  RuFus  Ellis, 

"  Edward  E.  Hale, 

"  F.  D.  Huntington, 

"  John  H.  Morison, 

"  Ephraim  Peabodt. 


PREFACE 


This  book  has  been  prepared  for  the  use  of 
the  oldest  classes  in  our  Sunday  Schools.  It  is 
not  a  child's  book,  therefore;  for  young  people 
of  sixteen  and  seventeen  years  of  age,  who  are 
the  youngest  for  whom  it  is  intended,  are  no 
longer  children. 

The  ease  with  which  such  readers  understand 
romances  intended  for  grown  people  assures  us 
that  we  need  not  attempt  to  adapt  its  language 
particularly  to  them. 

If  it  show  that  from  the  beginning  there  have 
been  constant  victories  of  the  Gospel,  —  that  the 
divisions  of  the  Church  have  been  varieties  of 
fashion,  changing  with  other  fashions,  —  and,  es- 
pecially, that  the  love  of  God  has  never  aban- 
doned his  world,  —  our  hopes  in  introducing  the 
subject  of  Christian  History  into  our  Sunday 
Schools  will  be  accomplished. 


VUl  PREFACE. 


We  have  chosen  single  scenes  only  of  that 
history,  because  it  was  impossible  in  this  space 
to  trace  along  a  continued  thread.  These  are 
about  thirty  footsteps  of  the  progress  of  the 
Gospel,  without  an  attempt  to  describe  the  whole 
of  the  highway  on  which  it  travels. 

Teachers  will  best  adapt  it  to  their  own  classes 
in  Sunday  Schools.  For  those  who  wish  to  use 
them,  a  series  of  questions  is  placed  at  the  end. 
It  will  be  easy  to  add  suggestions  for  reading 
to  the  notes  which  have  been  placed  at  the  end 
of  each  chapter. 

The  author  of  the  volume  is  indebted  to  two 
friends,  not  named  in  the  list  of  authors, 
who  have  furnished  two  very  valuable  chapters 
for  the  book,  —  which  will  be  readily  distin- 
guished from  those  which  surround  them. 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter  Page 

I.      PAUL  AND   NERO 11 

II.      TRAJAN,   AND    THE    DEATH   OF    IGNATIUS      .           .  23 

III.      CHRISTIANITY   IN   ASIA.  —  MONTANUS        ...  38 

IV.      ORIGEN,  AND   THE    SCHOOLS   OF   ALEXANDRIA      .  49 

V.      MARY  OF  NUMIDIA.  —  MARION. —  CHRISTIAN  LIFE  .  62 

VI.      CONSTANTINE            ....                       .           .  72 

VII.      JULIAN 85 

VIII.      THE    GOTHS.  —  AUGUSTINE    AND    PELAGIUS             .  95 
IX.      RELIGION   IN  THE    PALACE.  —  PULCHERIA  AND   EU- 

DOCIA 107 

X.      MAHOMET    .           .           .           .           .          .           .           .           .  119 

XI.      CHRISTIANS    MADE   BARBAROUS,   AS    THE    BARBARI- 
ANS   ARE    CONVERTED.  —  ST.   LEGER  .           .           .  129 
XII.      ALFRED .  138 

XIII.  HILDEBRAND,  OR  POPE  GREGORY  THE  SEVENTH. — 

CATHOLIC    SUPREMACY 147 

XIV.  THE    CRUSADES. — RICHARD    OF  ENGLAND   .           .  156 
XV.      THE    SLEEP   OF   THE   PEOPLE 166 

XVI.      OPPONENTS   OF   THE    ROMAN    POWER.  —  THE    ALBI- 

GENSE8 173 

XVII.      THE   BLACK  DEATH         ......  180 


CONTENTS. 


XVIII.      WICKLIFPE   AND  HUSS 188 

XIX.      SAVONAROLA 196 

XX.  CHRISTIAN   FINE   ARTS  AND   EMBLEMS            .           .  206 
XXI.  CHRISTIANITY  IN  AMERICA.  —  COLUMBUS.  —  BAL- 
BOA         215 

XXII.      MARTIN   LUTHER 221 

XXIII.  THE   JESUITS.  —  LOYOLA.  —  XAVIER       .           .           .  230 

XXIV.  THE  POLISH  UNITARIANS. — MARTIN  RUARUS   .  236 

XXV.  NEW   ENGLAND. — COTTON   MATHER       .           .           .  243 

XXVI.  THE   EIGHTEENTH   CENTURY.  —  SWEDENBORG .  248 

XXVII.  PROTESTANT   MISSIONS.  —  TAHITI            .           .           .  254 

XXVIII.      CONCLUSION                               259 

XXIX.      DICTIONARY   OP  SECTS 263 

QUESTIONS 273 


SCENES  EROM  CHRISTIAN  HISTORY. 


CHAPTER    1. 

PAUL    AND    NERO. 

The  last  chapter  of  the  book  of  Acts  ends  rather 
abruptly.  It  is  the  end  of  the  narrative  part  of  the 
New  Testament.  It  brings  the  Apostle  Paul  to  the  city 
of  Rome,  the  capital  of  the  civilized  world.  And  it 
tells  us  that  he  dwelt  there  "  two  whole  years  in  his  own 
hired  house,  and  received  all  who  came  in  unto  him, 
preaching  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  teaching  those 
things  which  concern  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  with  all 
confidence,  no  man  forbidding  him." 

Although  he  was  thus  suffered  to  remain  in  his  own 
house,  he  was  still  under  the  watch  of  the  Roman  gov- 
ernment. He  was  waiting  his  trial.  For  he  had  ap- 
pealed to  the  Emperor  for  a  trial,  from  Festus,  who  was 
the  governor  of  the  province  of  Judea.  And  at  his 
first  arrival  he  had  only  a  preliminary  hearing. 

Paul  had  long  nourished  a  desire  to  see  Rome.  There 
had  been  for  many  years  a  little  congregation  of  Chris- 
tians here,  to  which  he  had  written  a  letter,  the  longest 


12  PAUL   AND   NERO.  [a.  D.  60. 

of  his  Epistles  which  we  have.  He  wrote  this  letter* 
when  he  was  on  his  way  to  Jerusalem,  in  the  jour- 
ney which  is  described  in  the  twentieth  chapter  of  the 
Acts.  He  was  eager,  it  seems  from  it,  to  carry  the 
Gospel  even  to  the  farthest  parts  of  Europe.  He  was 
planning  a  journey  to  Spain  with  this  purpose.  And 
in  writing  to  the  Roman  Christians,  he  said  to  them, 
"  Whensoever  I  take  my  journey  into  Spain,  I  trust  to 
see  you  in  my  journey."  In  resolving  to  go  to  Jeru- 
salem on  this  expedition,  he  had  said  to  himself,  "  After 
that  I  must  see  Rome."  t  This  eager  desire  is  easily 
understood.  It  was  twenty  years  since  Paul  had  been 
converted  of  a  sudden  to  Christianity.  In  those  twenty 
years  he  had  travelled  widely  through  the  East,  —  had 
met  with  persons  of  great  dignity  and  power,  —  had 
seen  the  greatest  cities  and  people  of  the  countries  with 
which  Jerusalem  had  most  to  do.  He  was  on  a  journey 
to  Damascus  when  he  was  converted.  Damascus  was 
then,  as  it  is  now,  known  as  the  oldest  city  in  the  world. 
Then  he  had  travelled  in  Arabia,  in  Syria,  and  the 
eastern  islands  of  the  Mediterranean.  He  had  passed 
through  Asia  Minor,  —  where  he  lived  two  years  in 
Ephesus,  the  most  gorgeous  and  rich  of  the  Asiatic 
cities.  From  Asia  he  crossed  into  Macedonia  and 
Greece.  There  he  had  lived  in  Corinth,  the  most  lux- 
urious city  of  the  world,  and  had  preached  in  Athens, 
the  most  famous  and  learned.  But  all  these  cities,  re- 
markable as  they  were  for  one  reason  or  another, 
were   governed  by  rulers  from  the  great  capital  city, 

*  See  Chap.  xv.  26.  t  Acts  xix.  21. 


A.  D.  60.]     PAUL  APPEALS  TO  FESTUS.  13 

Rome.  They  all  sent  tribute  to  Rome.  They  all  re- 
ceived laws  and  governors  from  Rome.  They  had 
their  fashions  from  Rome.  They  spoke  the  language 
of  Rome  in  the  courts  and  public  offices.  For  all  the 
officers  were  subject  to  the  Emperor  at  Rome.  He 
appointed  them  or  removed  them  at  his  pleasure.  And 
therefore,  the  more  Paul  saw  of  the  grandeur  of  these 
cities,  or  of  the  state  of  their  governors,  the  more 
eager  he  must  have  been,  before  his  life  closed,  to  go 
to  the  city  which  was  the  ruler  of  all  of  them  ;  and,  if 
possible,  even  to  meet  the  Emperor,  whom  all  these  gov- 
ernors thus  obeyed. 

When,  therefore,  Festus,  the  governor  of  Judea,  ex- 
amined Paul,  Paul  made  use  of  a  right  which  every 
Roman  citizen  had,  —  and  claimed  a  trial  before  the 
Emperor.  Festus's  decision  would  probably  have  been 
in  his  favor.  But  Paul  was  so  eager  for  a  chance  to 
address  the  Roman  Emperor,  perhaps  in  person,  and 
to  visit  Rome  with  such  advantages  as  he  would  have, 
even  as  a  prisoner  there,  that  he  did  not  take  the  chance 
of  an  acquittal  by  Festus,  but  appealed  to  the  Emperor. 
The  Emperor  at  this  time  was  Nero.  Paul  speaks  of 
him  as  Csesar,  —  a  title  which  all  the  first  twelve  Em- 
perors took  from  Julius  Csesar,  the  first  of  their  number. 
And  he  is  also  called  Augustus, —  a  title  given  to  sev- 
eral of  the  Roman  Emperors. 

Paul  arrived  at  Rome,  after  the  dangerous  voyage 
described  in  the  book  of  Acts,  in  the  spring  of  the  year 
60  or  61  of  our  era.  The  book  of  Acts  describes  his 
reception  there.  But  we  must  turn  to  other  authorities 
to  find  the  condition  of  things  which  he  found  there, 

NO.   VIII.  2 


14  PAUL    AND    NERO.  [a.  D.  60. 

and  the  circumstances  of  his  trial.  These  authorities 
introduce  us  to  the  Emperor  Nero,  to  whom  he  had 
appealed. 

Nero  was  at  this  time  twenty-two  years  old.  He 
had  been  declared  Emperor  five  years  before,  on  the 
death  of  the  insane  and  cruel  Claudius.  A  boy  of 
fine  abilities,  grandson  of  an  Emperor,  and  son  of  an 
ambitious  mother,  he  had  been  educated  with  the  best 
training  Rome  could  give  him.  His  mother  was  the 
beautiful  Agrippina,  and  she  turned  all  her  efforts  early 
to  secure  him  the  throne,  which  he  so  early  gained. 
When  he  began  his  reign,  he  had  for  his  principal 
ministers  Seneca  and  Burrhus,  the  first  the  most  dis- 
tinguished philosopher,  and  the  other  the  best  soldier 
of  the  time.  Under  their  care  the  Empire  flourished, 
and  it  was  thought  that  Nero  would  be  the  most  humane 
and  generous  prince  ever  known.  So  little  can  we 
guess  of  the  future  of  a  boy  of  seventeen  !  He  meant 
well,  so  far  as  we  can  see.  But  Seneca,  his  tutor,  did 
not  dare,  and  his.  mother  did"  not  care,  to  restrict  one 
of  his  appetites  or  passions,  unless  it  crossed  their  own 
plans.  He  was  left  to  every  indulgence,  —  and  there 
was  none  which  he  did  not  try.  His  passions  grew  with 
what  they  fed  upon.  So  that  in  four  or  five  years,  just 
about  the  time  Paul  arrived  in  Italy,  the  prosperous 
period  of  Nero's  reign  was  at  an  end,  and  Rome  began 
to  find  that  she  was  ruled  by  a  young  man,  a  cowardly, 
licentious,  cruel  drunkard,  —  whose  vices  were  leading 
him  to  insanity,  and  who  was  making  his  first  use 
of  power  to  overthrow  those  by  whose  help  he  had 
gained  it. 


A.  D.  60.]  NERO    AND    HIS    MOTHER.  15 

In  the  space  allotted  to  these  lessons  it  is  impossible 
to  give  a  connected  account  even  of  the  movements  of 
such  princes  as  Nero,  or  such  preachers  as  Paul, 
though  they  had  so  much  to  do  with  Christian  history. 
It  will  only  be  possible  for  us  to  show  in  each  chapter 
of  this  book  some  single  points  from  which  the  student 
can  gain  an  idea  of  the  parties  concerned,  and  he  must 
then  make  it  his  duty  to  connect  together  these  several 
points  of  view  by  the  other  reading  for  which  he  may 
find  opportunity.  For  this  reading,  the  notes  to  each 
lesson  will  offer  some  suggestion. 

Paul's  landing  in  Italy,  and  his  first  journey  to  Rome, 
and  his  hearing  there,  furnish  the  first  of  these  single 
points  of  observation.  It  was  probably  in  A.  D.  60, 
twenty-nine  years  after  the  crucifixion  of  our  Lord. 
Paul  landed,  in  the  spring  of  that  year,  at  the  port  of 
Puteoli,  in  that  most  beautiful  bay  now  known  as  the 
Bay  of  Naples.  As  he  entered  the  busy  seaport,  he 
could  see  close  by,  on  the  shore  of  that  bay,  the  palaces 
of  the  Roman  Senators  and  other  noblemen  who  lived 
at  the  beautiful  watering-place  of  Baise.  There  was 
the  summer  home  of  the  Emperor ;  and  there,  we  know 
from  other  history,  the  Emperor  was  at  this  very  time 
of  this  very  year. 

There  had  been  a  bitter  and  growing  jealousy  be- 
tween him  and  his  beautiful,  but  wicked  mother.  This 
spring,  however,  Nero,  being  at  Baias,  at  his  summer 
palace,  sent  to  her  a  message  to  beg  her  to  visit  him 
there  that  they  might  reconcile  these  unnatural  ani- 
mosities. Agrippina  gladly  accepted  the  invitation, 
and  came  to  Baise,  as  invited,  to  celebrate  with  her  son 


16  PAUL    AND    NERO.  [a.  D.  60. 

there  the  feasts  of  Minerva,  which  occupied  part  of  the 
last  half  of  March.*  She  came  by  water.  Nero  met 
her  affectionately  at  the  shore,  took  her  by  the  hand 
and  embraced  her,  and  walked  with  her  to  the  villa, 
where  she  was  to  take  another  vessel  on  the  Lake  of 
Baise,  by  which  she  should  be  carried  to  the  palace 
where  she  was  to  stay.  There  she  and  her  son  staid 
in  conversation  till  the  afternoon  passed  away.  For  he 
was  trying  to  draw  along  the  time,  that  her  little  sail 
upon  the  lake  might  pass  in  the  evening.  At  last  he 
bade  her  good  evening,  with  more  warmth  than  seemed 
quite  necessary  for  what  she  must  have  thought  a  few 
hours'  parting.  It  was  either  to  keep  up  her  delusion 
that  this  was  a  reconciliation,  or  because  even  his  heart 
melted  a  little  at  the  thought  of  what  he  had  prepared. 
For  this  barge  —  adorned  with  great  pomp  as  for  an 
empress  —  had  been  carefully  arranged,  so  that,  at  a 
signal  given,  the  roof  of  the  cabin  should  fall  upon  all 
who  were  within,  and  crush  them  in  an  instant.  This 
was  Nero's  plan  for  putting  an  end  to  his  jealousies  of 
his  mother,  without  the  suspicion  of  matricide.  Upon 
the  lake  there  would  be  few  witnesses,  and  it  was 
meant  that  this  should  be  supposed  to  be  a  shipwreck, 
or  accident  of  the  sea.  Of  course  he  did  not  take 
passage  himself  on  the  fated  vessel,  but,  after  this 
affectionate  farewell  to  his  mother  retired  to  his  own 
palace  to  await  the  news  of  her  voyage.  The  night 
was  clear  and  the  stars  bright.  Agrippina  lay  on  her 
couch  in  her  cabin,  talking  gladly  with  her  attendants 

*  Erom  the  19th  to  the  26th. 


A.  D.  60.]  THE    EM71IESS    KILLED.  17 

of  her  son's  regret  for  what  had  passed,  and  the 
renewal  of  their  friendship,  when  of  a  sudden  the  deck 
above  them  fell  in.  Tt  was  heavily  piled  with  lead,  and 
it  crushed  to  death  the  officer  to  whom  she  was  talk- 
ing ;  but  so  lodged  on  the  high  sides  of  her  own  couch, 
which  were  stronger  than  they  were  meant  to  be, 
that  she  escaped  the  ruin.  Acerronia,  her  lady  in 
waiting,  escaped  also.  The  sailors  cried  that  the  barge 
was  sinking.  The  women  both  plunged  into  the  water, 
seeing  or  suspecting  that  death  awaited  them  all  upon 
the  vessel.  The  men  around  sprang  forward,  ready  to 
do  their  master's  bidding  in  a  less  clumsy  and  more 
certain  way.  But  Acerronia,  this  faithful  friend  of  the 
Empress,  with  a  woman's  wit  and  a  woman's  devotion, 
drew  on  her  own  head  the  blows  and  stabs  of  the  mur- 
derers above,  by  crying,  as  if  drowning,  "  Save  me, 
—  I  am  Nero's  mother!"  Uttering  those  words  of 
self-devotion,  she  was  killed  by  the  murderers  above, 
while  the  Empress,  in  safer  silence,  buoyed  up  by  frag- 
ments of  the  wreck,  floated  to  the  shore. 

So  Nero  failed  in  secret  crime,  and  yet  he  knew  that 
he  could  not  stop  here.  And  the  next  day  after  his 
mother's  deliverance  from  the  water,  he  sent  a  guard 
of  soldiers  to  her  palace  ;  and  there,  where  she  was 
deserted  even  by  her  last  attendant,  without  pretence 
of  secrecy,  they  put  to  death  the  daughter  and  the 
mother  of  a  Csesar. 

Such  a  man  was  the  Nero  to  whom  Paul  had  ap- 
pealed. And  Paul,  who  had  spent  the  past  winter  at 
Melita,  had  arrived  some  time  in  this  same  month  of 
March  at  Puteoli,  —  the  town  close  by  the  villas  of  Baise. 
2* 


18  PAUL    AND    NERO.  [a.   D.  60. 

Likely  enough  his  vessel  was  rowed  up  to  the  pier  at 
Puteoli,  as  the  Empress's  stately  barge  brought  her  to 
meet  her  son  at  Baise.  At  Puteoli  the  Christian  breth- 
ren desired  him  to  tarry  with  them  seven  days.  And 
he  made  his  visit  just  as  Agrippina  had  come  to  make 
hers  in  the  same  beautiful  region  with  her  son.  Paul 
then  went  towards  Rome.  It  is  a  journey  of  about  a 
hundred  miles.  The  Christians  in  Rome  heard  that  he 
had  arrived,  and  half  way  on  his  journey  he  met  some 
of  them,  —  poor  men  who  had  been  slaves,  most  likely, 
—  at  Appii  Forum,  and  Three  Taverns, — "whom 
when  Paul  saw,  he  took  courage." 

Nero  also  travelled  more  slowly  to  Rome.  Fearful 
of  the  sedition  of  the  army  after  such  a  crime,  he 
wrote  to  the  Senate,  declaring  that  he  had  ordered  that 
Agrippina  should  be  killed  only  when  he  had  arrested 
an  assassin  she  sent  to  murder  him.  The  Senate  was 
so  meanly  in  his  service  that  they  voted  thanks  to  the 
gods  for  his  success  ;  — appointed  an  annual  festival  in 
honor  of  his  murder  of  his  mother ;  —  and  that  her 
birthday  should  always  be  regarded  as  an  unlucky 
day,  when  no  business  of  state  should  be  begun.  Nero 
received  news  of  this  decree,  which  somewhat  quieted 
his  fears.  One  of  his  flatterers  ventured  to  assure  him, 
as  he  waited  to  hear  it,  "  that  the  name  of  Agrippina 
was  hated,  and  that  the  people  would  hear  her  death 
with  pleasure ;  that,  if  he  would  go  forward  boldly,  he 
would  find  its  veneration  ready  for  him.  He  found  in- 
deed," continues  the  historian,  "  all  this  more  evident 
than  it  had  been  promised.  The  people  came  out  in 
their  organized  bodies  as  electors  to  meet  him  ;  —  the 


A.  D.  60.]  SENECA.  19 

Senate  joined  in  the  procession  in  the  dresses  worn  on 
a  festival ;  —  bands  of  women  and  children  were  ar- 
ranged in  it  in  the  order  of  sex  and  age,  —  and  seats 
raised  on  each  side  above  the  way  by  which  he  came, 
—  that  they  might  look  upon  his  entrance  as  if  it  were 
a  triumph  after  victory.  Thus  proudly,  a  conqueror 
over  an  enslaved  people,  he  went  as  triumphing  con- 
querors do  to  the  Capitol,  and  rendered  thanks  ;  then 
flung  himself  into  every  sort  of  lust,  which  till  this 
time  some  reverence  for  his  mother  had,  though  in 
wretched  fashion,  restrained."  * 

If,  as  is  probable,  Paul's  first  hearing  took  place  this 
summer,  it  was  when  Nero  was  in  the  distress  of  mind 
which  followed  after  his  atrocious  crime.  It  was  in 
presence  of  Seneca,  who,  as  minister  of  state,  would 
give  the  directions  for  such  an  audience.  Seneca  must 
not  be  neglected  in  our  study  of  the  time,  for  as  Nero 
concentrated  all  the  power  of  the  time,  so  Seneca  was 
the  best  example  of  its  learning.  He  had  introduced 
Nero  into  power ;  had  restrained  his  madness  when  he 
could  ;  and  with  his  colleague  had  conducted  the  gen- 
eral administration  of  the  Empire  with  the  greatest 
honor,  while  the  boy  was  wearing  out  his  life  in  de- 
bauchery in  the  palace.  Seneca  dared  say  more  to 
Nero,  to  venture  more  with  him,  than  did  any  other 
man  of  those  around  him.  For  the  young  tiger  was 
afraid  of  his  old  master  long  after  he  had  tasted  blood. 
Yet  Seneca's  system  was  a  cowardly  system.  It  was 
the  best  of  Roman  morality,  and  still  it  was  mean.    His 

*  Tacit-  Ann.  xiv.  13. 


20  PAUL  AND  NERO.  [a.  D.  60. 

daring  was  the  bravest  of  the  men  of  the  old  civiliza- 
tion. He  is  the  type  of  their  excellences,  as  is  Nero 
the  model  of  their  power  and  their  adornments.  And 
yet  all  that  Seneca's  daring  could  venture,  was  to  se- 
duce the  baby-tyrant  into  the  least  injurious  of  tyran- 
nies. From  the  plunder  of  a  province  he  would  divert 
him  by  the  carnage  of  the  circus.  From  the  murder  of 
a  Senator  he  could  lure  him  by  some  new  lust  at  home. 
From  the  ruin  of  the  Empire  he  could  seduce  him  by 
diverting  him  with  the  ruin  of  a  noble  family.  And 
Seneca  did  this  with  the  best  of  motives.  He  said  he 
used  all  the  power  in  his  hands,  and  he  thought  he  did. 
For  he  had  not  what  Paul  had,  motives  to  offer  Nero. 
He  could  not  tell  him  what  God  made  him  for,  —  what 
God  wished  of  him.  He  could  only  warn  him  from 
vice  for  selfish  reasons.  And  they  were  reasons  which 
the  boy  did  not  choose  to  remember,  indeed,  could  not 
understand. 

From  Paul's  first  examination  the  immediate  results 
were,  that  his  "  bonds  were  made  manifest  in  all  the 
palace,  and  in  all  other  places,"  *  and  that  even  in 
Caesar's  household  persons  were  converted  to  Christ.t 
This  he  tells  us  in  his  own  letters.  What  else  happened 
there,  or  in  immediate  consequence  of  that  hearing,  his- 
tory has  not  told  us.  But  it  is  not  hard  to  imagine  Jiow 
Paul  would  seem,  or  Nero,  or  Seneca,  in  such  an  infor- 
mal hearing.  Paul  was  not  afraid  either  of  Seneca's 
wisdom  or  of  Nero's  cruelty.  A  few  weeks  before, 
when  the  Roman  Senate  so  praised  the  murder  of  a 


*  Epistle  to  the  Philippiaus,  i.  13.  \  Ibid  iv.  22. 


A.  D.  60.]  Paul's  victory.  21 

mother,  one  man,  named  Psetus,  had  been  bold  enough 
to  retire  from  the  vote,  saying,  "  Nero  may  kill  me,  but 
he  cannot  hurt  me."  Paul  could  say  this,  but  he  could 
say  more  too.  He  knew  too,  that,  even  if  Nero  killed, 
he  could  not  hurt  him,  —  and,  besides  this,  that  if  Nero 
killed  him,  he  would  only  serve  Christ's  kingdom  the 
more  by  doing  so.  Indeed,  Paul  had  seen  enough  of 
life,  but  for  the  desire  of  extending  the  Gospel.  "  For 
me,"  he  says,  writing  in  this  very  imprisonment,  "  for 
me  to  depart  and  to  be  with  Christ  is  far  better  "  *  than 
to  remain.  What  the  Roman  Psetus  could  not  do,  there- 
fore, Paul  could.  Poetus  proposed  nothing  in  opposition 
to  Nero's  cruelty.  He  only  brought  Nero's  vengeance 
on  himself  and  on  his  friends.  Nor  could  Seneca  pro- 
pose any  thing.  He  could  only  say  to  men,  that  they 
must  endure  bravely  what  came.  Paul  could  propose, 
teach,  insist  upon  the  whole  Gospel.  To  Nero  he  could 
say  that  the  empire  of  God  was  all  around  him,  close  at 
hand,  to  which  he  the  tyrant,  Seneca  the  philosopher, 
and  Paul  the  prisoner  were  alike  subjects.  And  as  this 
was  the  charge  Jesus  gave  to  all  his  messengers,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  Paul  did  press  it  upon  Nero,  — 
"  The  kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand."  Teaching  the 
Emperor  that,  even  if  he  died,  he  would  not  fear  for  the 
triumph  in  the  end  of  the  kingdom  he  proclaimed. 

He  was  sent  back  to  his  house,  to  wait  another  hear- 
ing. But  two  years  after  his  arrival  he  had  that  hear- 
ing, and  was  discharged.  For  he  had  committed  no 
crime  "  against  the  majesty  of  Rome,"  the  profession 

*  Epistle  to  the  Philippians,  i.  23. 


22  PAUL  AND  NERO.  [a.  D.  60. 

of  Christianity  not  yet  being  considered  such.  He  was 
at  liberty  to  go  to  Spain,  as  he  did,  and  to  wider  travels 
than  ever,  through  other  parts  of  Europe. 

In  that  first  measuring  of  strength  between  the  highest 
power  of  the  Gospel,  the  best  wisdom  of  the  world,  and 
the  greatest  concentration  of  the  world's  material  force, 
we  have  a  lesson  for  the  whole  history  which  we  are  to 
follow.  The  Gospel  preacher  is  put  off  at  first,  —  waits 
his  time,  and  triumphs  in  the  end. 

NOTES    TO    CHAPTER    L 

The  object  of  this  book  is  to  present  several  distinct  scenes 
which  have  passed  at  different  epochs  in  Christian  history.  It  is 
hoped  that  the  reader  will  be  enough  interested  to  look  farther  into 
the  circumstances  which  surround  them  and  into  the  events  which 
pass  between  them.  For  the  convenience  of  young  people  who 
are  willing  to  do  this,  we  place  at  the  end  of  each  chapter  some 
references  to  a  few  of  the  books  which  almost  every  one  can  obtain 
for  such  reading. 

Eor  general  purposes  for  the  whole  inquiry,  — 

Milman's  History  of  Christianity,  published  by  Harper 
&  Brothers,  1841. 

For  the  position  of  the  Roman  Empire  at  the  time  of  this  chap- 
ter,— 

Burnap's  Lectures  on  the  History  of  Christianity. 

Illustrations  of  the  Manners  of  Rome  at  the  time,  pleasantly  pre- 
sented, will  be  found  in 

Julia  of  Baiae.    New  York:  Saxton  &  Miles.    .12mo.     pp.257. 

Bnlwer's  Last  Days  of  Pompeii.     Harper  &  Brothers. 

Tacitus  Annal.  xiv.,  xv.,  which  may  easily  be  had  in  good  trans- 
lations, or  better,  by  students  of  Latin,  in  the  original. 

Young  persons  of  sixteen  and  seventeen  years  of  age,  for  whose 
use  this  book  is  intended,  cannot  too  soon  form  the  habit  of  con- 
sulting the  original  authors  in  any  inquiry. 


A.  D.  65.]  THE  FIRE  AT  ROME.  23 

CHAPTER    II. 

TRAJAN,    AND    THE    DEATH    OF    IGNATIUS. 

Within  a  few  years  after  Paul  was  set  free,  a  terrible 
fire  swept  over  a  great  part  of  Rome.  The  people  so 
hated  Nero,  that  they  suspected  him  of  having  set  fire 
to  the  city.  There  was  no  crime  so  atrocious  that  they 
would  not  believe  it  of  him.  He  was  conscious  that  he 
was  accused ;  perhaps  he  deserved  the  accusation,  and 
he  attempted,  with  a  cruelty  even  greater  than  that  with 
which  it  charged  him,  to  divert  suspicion  from  himself 
by  throwing  it  upon  others.  Now  the  Christians  in 
Rome  began  to  attract  attention.  Nero  must  have  rec- 
ollected bitterly  such  words  as  Paul  had  addressed  to 
him.  He  was  conscious,  too,  that  even  in  his  own  pal- 
ace were  some  of  this  nev/  sect,  which  believed  that 
God's  ^ule  over  men  was  closer  than  any  human  empire 
could  be.  Such  a  creature  as  Nero  needed  no  further 
reason  for  trying  to  make  the  Christians  the  victims  of 
suspicion  as  having  set  fire  to  the  city.  Fie  undertook 
to  pmish  them  as  guilty  of  the  crime.  The  historian 
Tacitus,  who  was  not  a  Christian,  and  knew  but  little 
of  Christians,  thus  describes  this  terrible  cruelty,  writing 
alout  fifty  years  after  it :  — 

"  The  infamy  of  that  horrible  transaction  still  adhered 
to  him.  In  order,  if  possible,  to  remove  the  imputa- 
tion, he  determined  to  transfer  the  guilt  to  others.  For 
this  purpose  he  punished,  with  exquisite  torture,  a  race 
of  men  detested  for  their  evil  practices,  by  vulgar  ap- 
pellaiion  comm'^nl-N^  (^.'illrr]  r^'^fi^fians. 


24  TRAJAN  AND  IGNATIUS.  [a.  D.  65. 

'^  The  name  was  derived  from  Christ,  who  in  the 
reign  of  Tiberius  suffered  under  Pontius  Pilate,  the  pro- 
curator of  Judea.  By  that  event  the  sect,  of  which  he 
was  the  founder,  received  a  blow,  which  for  a  time 
checked  the  growth  of  a  dangerous  superstition ;  but  it 
revived  soon  after,  and  spread  with  recruited  vigor,  not 
only  in  Judea,  the  soil  that  gave  it  birth,  but  even  in  the 
city  of  Rome,  the  common  sink  into  which  every  thing 
infamous  and  abominable  flows,  like  a  torrent,  fron  all 
quarters  of  the  world.  Nero  proceeded  with  his  usual 
artifice.  He  found  a  set  of  profligate  and  abandoned 
wretches,  who  were  induced  to  call  themselves  g^iilty ; 
and,  on  the  evidence  of  such  men,  a  number  of  Chris- 
tians were  convicted,  not  indeed  upon  clear  evdence 
of  their  having  set  the  city  on  fire,  but  rather  3n  ac- 
count of  their  sullen  hatred  of  the  human  race.  They 
were  put  to  death  with  exquisite  cruelty,  and  to  their 
sufferings  Nero  added  mockery  and  derision.  Some 
were  covered  with  the  skins  of  wild  beasts,  and  left  to 
be  devoured  by  dogs  ;  others  were  nailed  to  the  cross  ; 
numbers  were  burnt  alive  ;  and  many,  covered  \^ith  in- 
flammable matter,  were  lighted  up,  when  the  day  de- 
clined, to  serve  as  torches  during  the  night. 

"  For  the  convenience  of  seeing  this  tragic  spectacle, 
the  Emperor  lent  his  own  gardens.  He  added  the  sports 
of  the  circus,  and  assisted  in  person,  sometimes  driving 
a  curricle,  and  occasionally  mixing  with  the  rabble  in  his 
coachman's  dress.  At  length  the  cruelty  of  these  pro- 
ceedings filled  every  breast  with  compassion.  Human- 
ity relented  in  favor  of  the  Christians.  The  manners 
of  that  people  were,  no  doubt,  of  a  pernicious  tendency, 


A.  D.  65.]        PERSECUTIONS. PAUL  BEHEADED.  25 

and  their  crimes  called  for  the  hand  of  justice  ;  but  it 
was  evident  that  they  fell  a  sacrifice,  not  for  the  public 
good,  but  to  glut  the  rage  and  cruelty  of  one  man 
only." 

Such  was  the  first  public  persecution  of  the  Chris- 
tians by  the  government  of  the  Roman  Empire.  For 
their  sufferings,  which  are  described  in  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles,  were  the  work  of  Jewish  hatred.  From,  this 
time,  for  many  centuries,  there  are  different  occasions 
described,  which  are  known  as  the  primitive  persecu- 
tions. The  Christians  were  dragged  before  magistrates, 
as  Jesus  had  prophesied  they  would  be,  and  called  upon 
to  renounce  their  faith.  In  most  instances  they  stood 
firm.  They  suffered  death,  and  death  in  extreme  tor- 
ture, rather  than  deny  the  Redeemer.  Such  deaths  are 
the  deaths  of  martyrs.  From  their  testimony,  given 
with  so  much  courage,  the  cause  of  religion  has  gained 
more  than  it  has  gained  in  any  other  way.  And  there- 
fore it  has  become  a  proverb,  that  "  the  blood  of  the 
martyrs  is  the  seed  of  the  Church." 

Paul  had  returned  to  Rome,  from  journeys  in  distant 
parts  of  Europe,  and  in  this  persecution  by  Nero  he 
was  beheaded  by  order  of  the  governor  of  the  city,  at 
a  time  when  Nero  was  absent  in  Greece. 

We  cannot  in  this  book  follow  the  history  of  these 
different  persecutions.  Many  of  those  Christians  who 
have  since  been  known  as  saints  suffered  in  them. 
For  several  hundred  years  we  shall  meet  such  martyr- 
doms in  the  different  scenes  of  Christian  history  which 
we  examine. 

Without  stopping  for  such  histories  here,  we  will  look 


26  TRAJAN    AND    IGNATIUS.      [a.D.  98-117, 

in  this  chapter  at  the  reign  of  the  great  Roman  Emperoi 
Trajan.  It  is  to  be  noted,  because  it  begins  a  period  of 
more  than  fifty  years,  whicli  has  been  called  "the  happiest 
period  of  the  world's  history."  Trajan,  a  general  of  the 
E-oman  army,  was  called  to  the  throne  when  he  was 
about  fifty  years  old,  from  an  active  life  whh  the  army  in 
Germany.  The  real  joy  with  which  the  people  received 
him  might  be  seen  in  their  welcome,  and  in  his  trust  of 
them.  "  The  roofs  of  the  houses,"  says  one  of  his 
time,  "were  crowded.  You  could  not  see  any  place, 
strong  enough  to  bear  a  man,  on  which  one  did  not 
stand  ;  every  street  was  thronged,  and  only  a  narrow 
path  left  for  the  passage  of  the  new  Emperor."  "  He 
came  on  foot,  only  distinguished  by  his  height  and 
grace.  So  different  was  he  from  other  Emperors,  who 
were  used  to  enter  Rome,  not  merely  in  chariots  drawn 
by  white  horses,  but  even  on  the  shoulders  of  men." 

Trajan  always  observed  this  contrast  with  such  earlier 
Emperors  as  Nero.  He  could  just  recollect  the  times 
of  Nero  ;  but  he  was  not  then  in  Rome.  He  was  eager 
to  show  that  he  did  not  belong  to  the  same  kind  of  Em- 
perors as  Nero  and  Caligula,  —  two  men  who  will  never 
be  forgotten,  as  warnings  against  licentiousness  and 
cruelty.  He  received  the  title  of  the  lest  (Optimus), 
and  deserved  it  as  well  as  any  of  the  early  Emperors. 
When  he  and  his  wife,  after  his  inauguration  at  the 
Capitol,  went  to  the  palace,  she  turned  and  said  to  the 
people,  "  I  hope  I  may  go  from  this  place  with  the 
same  feeling  towards  you  with  which  I  come  in."  She 
made  good  her  hope  by  the  gentleness  of  her  life,  and 
Trajan  made  good  the  promises  with  which  he  came  to 
the  throne. 


4.  D.  98-117.]       THE  widow's  son.  27 

There  is  a  story  of  the  Emperor's  kindness  to  a 
mother  who  had  lost  her  son,  which  is  thus  told  by  the 
poet  Dante.  Dante  had  entered  that  circle  of  Pur- 
gatory where  spirits  were  atoning  for  the  sin  of  pride. 
He  found  that  on  one  side,  as  their  steps  moved  up- 
wards, was  cut  in  pure,  white  marble  such  sculpture 
as  not  even  Polycletes  or  Nature  herself  would  have 
scorned.  And  these  groups  all  imaged  some  scene 
that  had  been  enacted  on  earth,  in  which  the  virtue  of 
humility  had  been  displayed.  "  Here  was  portrayed 
the  sublime  glory  of  that  great  Roman  prince,  the  Em- 
peror Trajan.  Here  a  widow  stood  at  his  horse's  head 
showing  her  grief  by  her  tears.  Behind  him  the  ground 
was  trampled  and  crowded  by  cavaliers,  and  eagles  of 
gold  moved,  in  seeming,  in  the  wind.  Among  all  these, 
the  miserable  woman  seemed  to  say,  '  Sire,  give  me 
vengeance  for  my  son,  who  is  dead,  and  for  whom  I 
grieve.'  And  he  replied  to  her,  '  Wait  until  I  shall  re- 
turn.' And  she  answered,  'My  lord,'  —  as  one  whom 
grief  renders  impatient,  —  '  and  if  you  never  return?  ' 
And  he,  '  Whoever  fills  my  place  shall  render  you  jus- 
tice.' And  she  replied,  '  What  will  it  avail  you,  the 
justice  that  another  works,  if  you  forget  that  you  should 
do  yourself?  '  And  he  replied, '  Now  console  yourself, 
since  I  ought  indeed  fulfil  my  duty,  ere  I  move  from 
here.  Justice  wills  it,  and  pity  retains  me.'  "  It  is 
said  that  Trajan  found  the  slayer  of  the  widow's  son  to 
be  his  own  son.  He  offered  him  to  the  widow,  asking 
her  to  receive  him  in  place  of  him  who  was  dead.  And 
she  was  satisfied. 

Such  kindness  of  disposition  was  joined  in  Trajan  with 


28  TRAJAN    AND    IGNATIUS.      [a.D.  98-117. 

great  skill  in  government,  so  that  the  Roman  people  owed 
to  his  reign  new  roads,  cities,  and  new  arrangements 
of  law,  of  the  greatest  value  to  them.  They  enjoyed 
the  humanity  of  his  reign,  and  rose  in  no  sedition  which 
could  turn  him  into  a  severer  course.  So  that  in  all  the 
early  parts  of  it  the  Christians  did  not  suffer  from  per- 
secution, nor  was  there  any  general  desire  to  hunt 
them  out.  Indeed,  as  it  is  always  light  before  the  sun 
rises,  there  is  always  a  twilight  before  the  full  rising  of 
any  new  light  upon  the  world,  in  which  even  the  igno- 
rant gain  some  blessing  from  it  before  they  receive  it 
entirely.  Thus,  before  the  repeal  of  the  barbarous  laws 
of  England,  which  punished  men  for  stealing  as  severe- 
ly as  for  murder,  there  was  a  long  period  in  which  the 
gentle  practice  and  disposition  of  the  English  courts  and 
juries  made  the  execution  of  such  laws  much  milder 
than  their  direct  commands.  And  so,  at  this  period  in 
the  Roman  Empire,  the  Christian  Gospel  was  giving  a 
twilight  even  to  those  who  did  not  acknowledge  it  as 
the  truth,  or  did  not  efen  know  its  name.  All  over  the 
Roman  world  were  Christians  ;  many  more  than  when 
Paul  met  Nero  at  Rome.  The  children  whom  Paul 
knew  were  now  old  men.  Their  children  were  active 
Christian  men  and  women.  Wherever  they  were,  was 
gentleness,  truth,  and  firmness.  People  saw  that  these 
virtues  were  possible.  They  saw  what  they  were 
worth.  And  thus  many  a  man,  who  did  not  know  wKat 
it  was  to  be  religious,  was  made  a  better  man  by  the 
better  life  around  him.  Many  a  man,  who,  in  his  igno- 
rance, ridiculed  the  crucified  Saviour,  was  unconsciously 
obeying  his  commands  and  moved  by  his  spirit.     Tra- 


A..  D.   103.]     SIMEON    TRIED    AND    CRUCIFIED.  29 

jan  himself  could  not  resist  such  an  invisible  contagion. 
And  this  period,  which  certainly  was  a  happy  period,  — 
whether  the  happiest  or  not  of  the  world's  history,  — 
was  so  in  part  because  the  Christian  Gospel  was  gaining 
its  hold  on  the  minds  of  all  the  world. 

The  tranquillity  which  Christians  enjoyed  was  first 
broken  by  the  death  of  Simeon,  the  aged  minister  of  the 
church  at  Jerusalem,  by  birth  the  cousin  of  Jesus  Christ 
himself.  He  was  the  son  of  Cleopas  and  Mary,  sister  of 
the  Lord's  mother.  He  had  lived  to  be  m^re  than  a  hun- 
dred years  old,  and  was  one  of  the  few  left  who  could 
tell  of  having  seen  Jesus  face  to  face.  Some  cruel  in- 
formers, making  false  use  of  the  Christian  belief  in  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  —  of  which  we  sometimes  speak 
of  Jesus  as  the  King,  —  dragged  this  old  man  before  a 
magistrate,  because  he  was  known  to  be  of  the  tribe  of 
King  David,  from  which  old  Jewish  tradition  said  the 
King  of  the  Jews  would  come.  "  For  many  days, 
tried  by  the  most  severe  tortures,  he  constantly  pre- 
served, his  faith  in  Christ,  so  that  the  magistrate  him- 
self, and  all  who  were  present,  greatly  wondered  in 
what  way  a  man  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  old 
could  bear  such  torture.  At  length  he  was,  by  sen- 
tence, affixed  to  the  cross." 

These  are  the  words  of  the  Christian  historian  Euse- 
bius,  who  does  not  give  the  precise  charge  under  which 
Simeon  suffered.  It  was  not  necessary  that  he  should, 
—  for  the  Christians  were  all  open  to  the  same  charge, 
and  when  tried  were  not  able  to  escape  punishment 
for  it.  This  was,  that  they  would  not  worship  the  image 
of  the  Emperor.  If  they  escaped  persecution,  it  was 
3* 


30  TRAJAN    AND    IGNATIUS.  [a.  D.   111. 

only  because  no  one  saw  fit  to  inform  against  them. 
Any  man  who  had  a  pique  agamst  any  Christian  might 
enter  a  complaint  against  him,  and  then,  when  called 
to  trial,  he  would  be  forced  to  say  whether  or  not  he 
were  willing  to  worship  the  Emperor's  image  as  if  it 
were  a  god.  The  Roman  governors  did  not  care  how 
many  new  gods  were  worshipped.  But  if  a  formal 
complaint  were  made  before  them,  it  was  their  duty, 
under  their  law,  to  find  if  the  old  were  disregarded. 
And  so,  for  ir^tance,  in  this  trial  of  Simeon,  the  charge 
by  which  he  was  called  up  for  trial,  that  he  was  dan- 
gerous to  the  state  because  of  the  family  of  David, 
was  easily  disposed  of.  The  governor  would  have  dis- 
missed such  a  charge  as  ridiculous.  But  when  in  the 
examination  he  was  asked  to  worship  the  Emperor's 
likeness,  as  if  he  was  a  god,  there  came  in  a  new  test, 
which  Simeon  could  not  pass,  nor  could  any  other 
Christian. 

The  chief  reason  of  policy  which  the  Roman  gov- 
ernment had  in  trying  to  suppress  Christian  organiza- 
tions, when  informed  of  them,  was  the  unwillingness  to 
have  any  secret  societies  existing  in  the  Empire.  Just 
as  the  French  President  now  (1852)  tries  to  break  up 
all  private  societies,  of  whatever  kind,  as  dangerous  to 
his  government.  Trajan,  mild  as  he  was,  looked  on 
them  with  suspicion.  It  happened  once,  that,  after  a 
destructive  fire,  which  had  burned  two  public  buildings 
in  the  city  of  Nicomedia,  the  governor  of  the  province, 
Pliny,  wrote  to  him  to  ask  leave  to  form  a  company  of 
firemen  there.  He  says  he  has  prepared  hose,  and 
hooks,  and  other  implements,  and,  with  the  Emperor's 


A.  D.  111.]  trajan's  mildness.  31 

leave,  will  form  a  company  of  a  hundred  and  fifty- 
firemen.  "  I  will  take  care,"  he  says,  "  that  none  but 
laboring  men  shall  belong  to  it,  and  that  they  shall  do 
nothing  but  firemen's  duty.  It  will  be  easy  to  watch 
so  few."  But  the  Emperor  writes  back  :  "  A  great 
many  people  have  proposed  these  fire  companies.  But 
the  province  is  still  troubled  by  party  strife.  Whatever 
you  call  your  companies,  they  will  become  political 
ckibs."  And  so  he  forbade  the  formation  of  any.  It 
was  the  same  dread  of  the  meeting  together  of  people, 
which  made  the  chief  cause  of  the  suspicion  with  which 
the  Christians  were  observed.  Trajan  had  no  more 
objection  to  men's  being  Christians  than  to  their  being 
firemen.  But  he  feared  their  meetings  in  one  case,  as 
in  the  other. 

But  Trajan  was  a  just  prince  ;  and  as  a  soldier  he 
had  learned,  what  soldiers  have  often  known  better  than 
men  unused  to  war,  how  terrible  is  the  use  of  violence 
in  government.  He  had  no  desire  to  awake  through 
his  empire  the  excitement,  the  distress,  perhaps  the 
suspicion,  which  he  would  rouse  by  inquiring  too  closely 
who  would  reverence  the  gods  of  Rome,  and  who  would 
not.  He  had  doubtless  met  Christians,  and  doubtless 
respected  the  grand  simplicity  of  their  lives.  More 
and  more  the  men  of  learning  and  science  around  him 
attended  to  these  teachers  of  a  new  faith.  It  was  not 
now  confined  almost  wholly  to  slaves  or  freedmen,  as 
when  Paul  preached.  And  so  Trajan  gave  as  mild  an 
answer  as  an  absolute  heathen  emperor  could  do,  when 
Pliny  wrote  to  him  to  ask  what  he  should  do  with  re- 
gard to  this  growing  sect  of  Christians.      Pliny  was 


32  TRAJAN    AND    IGNATIUS.  [a.  D.   112, 

governor  of  Pontus  and  Bithynia,  two  provinces  in 
which  were  still  living  many  Christians  who  had  heard 
Paul  preach  in  his  travels  in  Asia  Minor.  It  was  to 
churches  in  these  provinces  that  he  had  addressed  some 
of  his  letters.  There  were  naturally  many  stern  and 
firm  Christians  there,  who  had  no  thought  of  abandon- 
ing their  faith.  Till  he  came  into  his  province  Pliny 
had  never  been  present  at  an  examination  of  any  Chris- 
tian. He  wrote  at  once  to  Trajan  the  following  letter, 
asking  how  he  should  proceed  towards  them.     . 

"  Pliny  to  Trajan. 

"  It  is  a  rule.  Sir,  which  I  inviolably  observe,  to  refer 
myself  to  you  in  all  my  doubts  ;  for  who  is  more  capa- 
ble of  removing  my  scruple,  or  informing  my  igno- 
rance ?  Having  never  been  present  at  any  trials  con- 
cerning those  who  profess  Christianity,  I  am  unac- 
quainted, not  only  with  the  nature  of  their  crimes,  or 
the  measure  of  their  punishment,  but  how  far  it  is 
proper  to  enter  into  an  examination  concerning  them. 
Whether,  therefore,  any  difference  is  usually  made 
with  respect  to  the  ages  of  the  guilty,  or  no  distinction 
is  to  be  observed  between  the  young  and  the  adult ; 
whether  repentance  entitles  them  to  a  pardon,  or,  if  a 
man  has  been  once  a  Christian,  it  avails  nothing  to  de- 
sist from  his  error ;  whether  the  very  profession  of 
Christianity,  unattended  with  any  criminal  act,  or  only 
the  crimes  themselves  inherent  in  the  profession,  are 
punishable  ;  —  in  all  these  points  I  am  greatly  doubtful. 
In  the  mean  while,  the  method  I  have  observed  towards 
those  who  have  been  brought  before  me  as  Christians 


A.  D.   112.]        PLINY's    letter    to    TRAJAN.  33 

is  this :  I  interrogated  them  whether  they  were  Chris- 
tians ;  if  they  confessed,  I  repeated  the  question  twice, 
adding  threats  at  the  same  time  ;  and  if  they  still  per- 
severed, I  ordered  them  to  be  immediately  punished ; 
for  I  was  pereuaded,  whatever  the  nature  of  their  opin- 
ions might  be,  a  contumacious  and  inflexible  obstinacy 
certainly  deserved  correction.  There  were  others  also 
brought  before  me  possessed  with  the  same  infatuation  ; 
but,  being  citizens  of  Rome,  I  directed  that  they  should 
be  carried  thither.  But  this  crime  spreading  (as  is 
usually  the  case)  while  it  was  actually  under  prose- 
cution, several  instances  of  the  same  nature  occurred. 
An  information  was  presented  to  me,  without  any  name 
subscribed,  containing  a  charge  against  several  persons  ; 
these,  upon  examination,  denied  they  were,  or  ever  had 
been.  Christians.  They  repeated  after  me  an  invoca- 
tion to  the  gods,  and  offered  religious  rites  with  wine 
and  frankincense  before  your  statue  (which,  for  that 
purpose,  I  had  ordered  to  be  brought,  together  with 
those  of  the  gods),  and  even  reviled  the  name  of 
Christ ;  whereas  there  is  no  forcing,  it  is  said,  those  who 
are  really  Christians  into  any  of  these  compliances. 
I  thought  it  proper,  therefore,  to  discharge  them.  Some 
among  those  who  were  accused  by  a  witness  in  person 
at  first  confessed  themselves  Christians,  but  immedi- 
ately after  denied  it ;  the  rest  owned,  indeed,  they  had 
been  of  that  number  formerly,  but  had  now  (some 
above  three,  others  more,  and  a  few  above  twenty 
years  ago)  renounced  that  error.  They  all  worshipped 
your  statue,  and  the  images  of  the  gods,  uttering  im- 
precations at  the  same  time  against  the  name  of  Christ. 


34  TRAJAN    AND    IGNATIUS.  [a.  D.   112. 

They  affirmed  the  whole  of  their  guilt  or  error  was, 
that  they  met  on  a  certain  stated  day  before  it  was 
light,  and  addressed  themselves  in  a  form  of  prayer  to 
Christ,  as  to  some  god,  binding  themselves  by  a  solemn 
oath,,  not  for  the  purposes  of  any  wicked  design,  but 
never  to  commit  any  fraud,  theft,  or  adultery  ;  never 
to  falsify  their  word,  nor  deny  a  trust  when  they  should 
be  called  upon  to  deliver  it  up.  After  which,  it  was 
their  custom  to  separate,  and  then  reassemble,  to  eat 
in  common  a  harmless  meal.  From  this  custom,  how- 
ever, they  desisted  after  the  publication  of  my  edict, 
by  which,  according  to  your  commands,  I  forbade  the 
meeting  of  any  assemblies.  In  consequence  of  this 
their  declaration,  I  judged  it  the  more  necessary  to 
endeavor  to  extort  the  real  truth,  by  putting  two  female 
slaves  to  the  torture,  who  were  said  to  officiate  in  their 
religious  functions  ;  but  all  I  could  discover  was,  that 
these  people  were  actuated  by  an  absurd  and  excessive 
superstition.  I  deemed  it  expedient,  therefore,  to  ad- 
journ all  further  proceedings,  in  order  to  consult  you. 
For  it  appears  to  be  a  matter  highly  deserving  your 
consideration  ;  more  especially  as  great  numbers  must 
be  involved  in  the  danger  of  these  prosecutions,  which 
have  already  extended,  and  are  still  likely  to  extend,  to 
persons  of  all  ranks  and  ages,  and  even  of  both  sexes. 
In  fact,  this  contagious  superstition  is  not  confined  to 
the  cities  only,  but  has  spread  its  infection  among  the 
neighboring  villages  and  country.  Nevertheless,  it  still 
seems  possible  to  restrain  its  progress.  The  temples, 
at  least,  which  were  once  almost  deserted,  begin  now 
to  be   frequented  ;  and  the  sacred   solemnities,  after  a 


A.  D.    112.]  THE    emperor's    ANSWER.  35 

long  intermission,  are  revived  ;  to  which  I  nnust  add, 
there  is  again  also  a  general  demand  for  the  victims, 
which  for  some  time  past  had  met  with  but  few  pur- 
chasers. From  the  circumstances  I  have  mentioned,  it 
is  easy  to  conjecture  what  numbers  might  be  reclaimed 
if  a  general  pardon  were  granted  to  those  who  shall  re- 
pent of  their  error." 

To  this  letter  of  Pliny's,  the  Emperor  wrote  the  fol- 
lowing reply :  — 

"  The  method  you  have  pursued,  my  dear  Pliny, 
in  the  proceedings  against  those  Christians  who  were 
brought  before  you,  is  extremely  proper  ;  as  it  is  not 
possible  to  lay  down  any  fixed  rule  by  which  to  act  in 
all  cases  of  this  nature.  But  I  would  not  have  you  offi- 
ciously enter  into  any  inquiries  concerning  them.  If, 
indeed,  they  should  be  brought  before  you,  and  the 
crime  should  be  proved,  they  must  be  punished  ;  with 
this  restriction,  however,  that  where  the  party  denies 
that  he  is  a  Christian,  and  shall  make  it  evident  that  he 
is  not,  by  invoking  our  gods,  let  him  (notwithstanding 
any  former  suspicion)  be  pardoned  upon  his  repentance. 
Informations  without  the  accuser's  name  subscribed 
ought  not  to  be  received  in  prosecutions  of  any  sort ;  as 
it  is  introducing  a  very  dangerous  precedent,  and  by  no 
means  agreeable  to  the  equity  of  my  government." 

We  have  copied  these  letters  at  length,  because  they 
show  the  wide  spread  of  the  Christian  faith  while  men 
were  living  who  heard  its  first  preachers  ;  because  they 
show  the  forbearance  of  Trajan  ;  and  yet,  the  dangers 
to  which,  in  spite  of  that  forbearance.  Christians  were 


36  TRAJAN   AND   IGNATIUS.  [a.  D.   116. 

subjected,  under  the  Roman  rule,  wherever  a  prejudiced 
or  angry  informer  chose  to  "  haul  them  before  the  mag- 
istrates." One  of  those  who  thus  suffered  was  Ignatius, 
the  minister  of  Antioch,  the  place  where  the  disciples 
were  first  called  Christians.  He  had  heard  St.  Peter 
preach  there,  and  had  known  St.  John.  He  was  so  old, 
that  it  used  to  be  said  of  him  that  he  was  the  child  whom 
Jesus  took  in  his  arms  when  he  taught  the  disciples  who 
was  greatest  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  But  this  proba- 
bly was  a  mistake,  although  he  was  as  old  as  that  child 
would  have  been. 

He  was  not  anxious  to  escape  a  martyr's  glory,  — 
perhaps  too  anxious  for  it.  And  so  it  seems  that,  when 
the  Emperor  passed  through  Antioch  on  one  of  his 
Eastern  campaigns,  Ignatius  was  of  his  own  accord 
led  before  him.  Trajan  could  not  overlook  him,  as 
he  would  perhaps  have  been  glad  to  do.  He  appeared 
before  the  Emperor  at  a  time  of  general  dread.  It  was 
just  after  a  terrible  earthquake,  which  had  destroyed 
much  of  the  city,  and  many  lives.  Perhaps  Trajan  was 
more  eager  for  this  to  make  a  show  of  respecting  the 
gods  whom  he  affected  to  worship.  After  his  exam- 
ination Trajan  pronounced  this  sentence  against  him  : 
"  Forasmuch  as  Ignatius  has  confessed  that  he  carries 
about  within  himself  Him  that  was  crucified,  we  com- 
mand that  he  be  carried,  bound  by  soldiers,  to  the  great 
Rome,  there  to  be  thrown  to  the  beasts,  for  the  enter- 
tainment of  the  people." 

This  sentence  was  executed.  By  a  long  voyage, 
Ignatius  was  carried  to  Rome,  that  his  death  might  be 
an  amusement  to  the  people  at  the  shows  in  the  amphi- 
theatre. ' 


A.  D.   116.]  IGNATIUS    PUT    TO    DEATH.  37 

"  And  so,  all  the  brethren  kneeling  down,  he  prayed 
to  the  Son  of  God,  in  behalf  of  the  churches,  that  he 
would  put  a  stop  to  the  persecution,  and  continue  the 
love  of  brethren  towards  each  other ;  which  being  done, 
he  was  with  all  haste  led  into  the  amphitheatre,  and 
speedily,  according  to  the  command  of  Caesar  before 
given,  thrown  in,  the  end  of  the  spectacles  being  at 
hand  ;  for  it  was  then  a  very  solemn  day,  called  in  the 
Roman  tongue  the  thirteenth  of  the  Calends  of  January, 
upon  which  the  people  were  more  than  ordinarily  wont 
to  be  gathered  together.  Thus  was  he  delivered  to  the 
cruel  beasts,  near  the  temple,  by  wicked  men." 

Every  such  cruelty  as  this  called  attention  to  the 
Christian  faith.  And  all  that  it  needed  for  its  growth  was 
attention.  A  scene  like  Ignatius's  martyrdom  was  trans- 
acted in  the  presence,  perhaps,  of  50,000  persons. 
They  asked,  they  could  not  but  ask,  what  Christians 
were.  And  there  were  now  enough  ready  to  tell  them. 
Outbreaks  of  violence  still  dragged  Christians  to  wild 
beasts  or  other  torture.  But  it  was  not  the  wish  of  the 
Emperors.  It  is  said  that  the  way  in  which  Ignatius 
bore  his  sufferings  moved  Trajan's  heart  when  he  heard 
of  it,  far  away  in  the  East,  and  that  afterwards  he  was 
milder  than  ever  toward  the  Christians. 

His  successor,  Hadrian,  took  pains  also  to  check,  as 
far  as  he  could,  the  entering  of  complaints  against  them. 

NOTES    TO    CHAPTER    II. 

Young  students,  Avho  would  read  more  of  the  first  generation 
after  the  death  of  the  Apostles,  arc  referred,  besides  the  books 
named  at  tlie  end  of  Chap.  I.,  to 
NO.  VIII.  4 


38  CHRISTIANITY  IN  ASIA.  [a.  D.    150. 

Gibbon's  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire,  in  Milman's 
edition.  Published  by  Harper  &  Brothers,  and  Phillips,  Sampson, 
&Co. 

The  Gospel  its  own  Advocate.  By  George  Griffin.  New 
York:  Appleton  &  Co.     1850. 

"  Valerius,"  by  Lockhart ;  the  scene  of  which  is  laid  in  the 
time  of  Trajan  among  Christians  in  Rome. 

"  The  Apostolic  Epistles,"  of  which  those  of  Ignatius  are  gen- 


CHAPTER    III. 

CHRISTIANITY    IN    ASIA. MONTANIJS. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  Rome,  although  the  cap- 
ital, was  by  no  means  the  geographical  centre  of  the 
Roman  Empire.  Still  less  was  it,  in  any  sense,  the  cen- 
tre of  that  world  into  which  our  Lord  had  sent  out  his 
apostles  and  disciples  to  preach  the  word.  He  had  bid- 
den them  go  and  preach  to  all  nations,  and  they  had 
literally  obeyed  the  direction. 

Whoever,  indeed,  should  attempt  to  point  out  the 
place  in  the  eastern  hemisphere  practically  the  most 
central  in  its  movements,  and  therefore  the  place  from 
which  an  important  message  could  be  most  easily  sent 
to  all  parts  of  it,  would  place  his  finger  upon  Egypt  or 
Palestine.  The  caravans  of  land  commerce  of  Asia  and, 
Africa  met  in  these  countries ;  and  to  their  ports  came 
the  ships  from  the  Eastern  oceans,  from  the  Atlantic  and 
the  Mediterranean.  So  much  is  clear  to  us  in  that 
providence  in  which  God  chose  Egypt  and  Palestine  to 
be  the  lands  where  his  two  great  covenants  of  the  Old 


A.  D.   150.]  RELIGIOUS    SPIRIT    OF    ASIA.  39 

Testament  and  the  New  should  be  made  with  men. 
From  Jerusalem,  the  capital  of  one  of  these  central  na- 
tions, the  apostles  of  Jesus  first  went  forth.  The  church 
of  Jerusalem  was  a  central  church  to  them,  till  the  de- 
struction of  that  city.  The  Christians,  at  that  time, 
warned  by  the  prophecies  of  its  fall,  had  abandoned  it 
to  its  fate.  This  was  when  those  were  old  men  who 
had  themselves  heard  the  words  of  Jesus.  Few,  if  any, 
Christians  suffered  in  the  terrible  downfall  of  the  Holy 
City. 

It  must  be  remembered,  again,  that  until  Paul  saw  in 
his  vision  the  man  of  Macedonia,  and  crossed  into 
Greece,  the  spread  of  the  Gospel  had  been  wholly  in 
Asia.  And  for  many  centuries  it  extended  itself,  in 
different  regions  of  Asia,  far  and  quickly.  Unfortu- 
nately, we  have  no  account  of  the  first  preaching  in 
Asia,  except  in  Palestine  and  in  Asia  Minor.  But  we 
know  that  very  early  in  the  Christian  history  there  were 
churches  scattered  over  the  western  part  of  that  great 
continent,  as  far  as  India. 

For  it  must  be  remembered,  also,  that  in  the  mind  of 
all  Asiatic  nations  yet  known  God  has  implanted  a  sin- 
gular willingness  to  embrace  a  belief  in  spiritual  things. 
All  spiritual  religions  which  the  world  has  ever  known 
began  there.  And  with  no  great  power  for  reasoning  or 
for  constructing,  the  men  and  people  of  Asia  have  never 
been  slow  to  worship  and  believe.  At  the  time  of  Jesus's 
death  a  providential  preparation  for  an  easy  appeal  to 
the  nations  of  Western  Asia  had  been  made  in  the  lan- 
guage of  those  regions.  The  conquests  of  Alexander 
the  Great  led  to  no  humediate  result  which  could  be 


40  BIONTANUS.  [a.  D.   150. 

seen.  He  died,  in  a  drunken  revel,  in  Babylon.  But 
the  after  result,  which  his  generals  little  thought  of, 
was,  that  where  his  successors  established  kingdoms, 
there  the  Greek  language  was  known  and  spoken. 
Western  Asia  and  Africa  and  Greece  became  one  in 
language.  And  so  James  and  Peter  and  John  could 
write  in  the  Greek  language  to  the  faithful  scattered 
through  all  that  part  of  the  world.* 

The  different  original  character  of  the  people  who 
have  received  the  Gospel  anywhere,  is  always  shown  in 
their  view  of  it,  even  long  after  their  conversion.  Jesus 
came,  indeed,  not  to  destroy,  but  to  fulfil.  His  Gospel 
gives  a  new  power  of  life  to  the  believer.  In  using 
it,  the  believer  will  of  course  use  it  in  those  directions 
which  are  innocent,  in  which  he  used  his  old  power 
of  life.  So,  from  the  first,  the  Christians  of  Judea 
were  different  in  some  matters  from  the  Christians  of 
Rome  ;  these,  again,  differed  from  those  of  Africa  ;  and 
from  all  of  these  the  Christians  of  Asia  Minor,  or  of 
Mesopotamia,  differed  as  much,  in  turn. 

A  short  account  of  Montanus  and  the  Christians  who 
followed  him  will  illustrate  this  distinction.  And  such 
distinctions,  of  which,  from  that  day  to  this,  there  have 
been  thousands,  of  country,  of  language,  or  of  early 
training,  are  the  origin  of  almost  all  the  sects  into  which, 
then  or  now,  the  Christian  world  has  been  divided. 

Montanus  was  born  in  Phrygia,  one  of  the  districts 
where  Paul  travelled  and  preached  while  he  was  yet  in 
Asia.     It  was  not  long  after  the  time  when  Pliny,  into 

*  See  the  Catholic  Epistles,  as  James  i.  1 ;  1  Peter  i.  1. 


A.  D.   150.]  MONTANUS    CONVERTED.  41 

whose  province  this  very  district  came,  wrote  the  letter 
in  the  last  chapter,  asking  what  he  should  do  with  the 
Christians.  From  Paul's  letters  to  the  Ephesians  and 
Colossians,  it  is  easy  to  see  what  were  the  dangers  of 
the  church  in  that  region.  The  Phrygians,  especially, 
were  a  people  always  known  as  easily  excited  by  magic 
and  superstition.  The  worship  of  the  Phrygian  goddess 
Cybele,  in  Rome,  as  introduced  from  Phrygia,  was  as 
wild  and,  exciting  as  the  wildest  dancing  of  the  modern 
Shakers.  It  was  conducted  in  the  open  streets,  by 
priests  and  priestesses  in  a  perfect  frenzy.*  Now,  in 
these  letters  of  Paul,  it  will  be  found  that  that  sort  of 
religious  excitement,  even  in  his  time,  was  apt  to  seize 
upon  the  Christian  converts  in  those  lands. 

Montanus  was  born  in  a  heathen  family.  But  as  he 
grew  up,  the  earnest  Christians  around  him  converted 
him  to  the  new  faith.  It  was  at  a  time  of  persecution. 
All  the  more  eagerly  did  he  seize  it.  He  was  not  satis- 
fied with  the  requisitions  usually  made  on  believers. 
He  fasted  more  than  his  teachers  did.  He  heard  men 
talk  of  corruptions  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Church,  for  of 
such  corruptions  they  talked  even  in  the  Apostles'  time, 
and  have  talked  ever  since.  He  was  eager  to  recall  it 
to  its  poverty,  its  simplicity,  and  its  purity. 

There  were  around  him  those  who  had  tried  to  make 
very  fine-drawn  distinctions  in  its  doctrines.  These  of- 
fended his  new  ardor.  He  protested  against  them.  He 
declared  it  infamous  to  chain  the  Spirit  of  God  with 
such  artificial  and  human  theories.     We  must  suppose, 

*  See  Lockhart's  Valerius. 

4* 


42  MONTANUS.  [a.  D.   150. 


that,  in  his  own  life,  he  knew  what  a  change  this  Holy 
Spirit  had  wrought  in  him.  He  knew,  as  sooner  or 
later  every  Christian  knows,  how  great  a  difference 
there  is  between  the  life  which  is  working  with  God, 
and  helped  by  him,  and  that  which  has  not  sought  his 
favor. 

But  he  did  not  find  that  those  around  him  shared  his 
enthusiasm.  It  often  happens  to  young  converts,  that 
they  think  those  cold  and  dead  who  are  habituated  to 
the  influences  of  faith  and  the  Spirit,  and  who  therefore 
say  but  little  of  its  power.  Justly  or  unjustly,  Montanus 
thought  so  of  the  preachers  and  bishops  around  him. 
Full  himself  of  the  native  zeal  of  his  country,  excited 
too  by  the  ardor  of  his  recent  conversion,  he  declared 
to  them  that  they  rested  on  an  old  faith,  whidh  God 
meant  should  be  enlarged  and  unfolded.  He  quoted 
Paul's  words,  "  We  see  in  part,  and  we  prophesy  in 
part,"  and  begged  them  to  see  if  the  Holy  Spirit  would 
not  lead  them  farther  than  Paul,  to  see  the  whole  and  to 
prophesy  the  whole.  The  religion  of  the  world  had 
gone  on  developing,  he  said.  There  was  one  step  from 
the  Patriarchs'  religion  to  Moses's  Law  ;  another  from 
that  to  the  Gospel ;  and  from  the  Gospel,  God  must 
mean  that  there  should  be  others  farther  still. 

Among  such  a  people  as  the  Phrygians,  these  earnest 
appeals  of  Montanus  found  those  who  embraced  them 
eagerly,  and  carried  them  and  him  farther  yet.  Pris- 
cilla  and  Maximilla,  two  noble  ladies,  gave  their  for- 
tunes up  to  help  in  his  effort  to  arouse  what  they  all 
thought  the  dulness  and  sleep  of  the  Christians  round 
them.     They  even  parted  from  their  husbands,  in  the 


A.  D.  150.]     STRANGE  EXTRAVAGANCES.  43 

ascetic  spirit  which  had  led  Montanus  to  preach  much 
about  the  efficacy  of  fasting.  They  announced  them- 
selves as  prophetesses.  They  said,  there  was  no  rea- 
son why  it  should  be  thought  that  the  gift  of  prophecy 
had  left  the  Church.  And  they  gave  great  scandal  to 
the  bishops  or  ministers,  by  asserting  that  "  Patriarchs  " 
held  the  first  rank  in  the  Church,  prophets  of  an  order 
which  they  called  Cenones  the  second,  and  that  the 
bishops  were  only  the  third  in  station. 
■  Such  was  the  beginning  of  a  movement  called  Mon- 
tanism.  There  is  no  doubt,  even  from  the  accounts  ot 
its  worst  enemies,  that  it  began  in  the  generous  zeal  of 
a  young  convert  to  the  faith.  It  has  shared  the  fate, 
however,  of  all  systems  which  have  had  to  meet  at- 
tacks, in  being  terribly  misrepresented  by  those  it  op- 
posed. And  as  it  went  on,  it  plunged,  and  its  leaders 
plunged,  into  one  and  another  strange  extravagance. 
Montanus  soon  announced  that  he  was  sent  by  God  to 
bring  the  additional  light  to  the  Church  which  it  need- 
ed ;  that  he  was  the  Comforter  promised  by  Jesus  in 
the  last  conversation  with  the  Apostles  before  his  death. 
But  still  his  eager  wish  was,  that  the  disciples  would 
seek  the  influence  of  the  Holy  Spirit  in  their^wn  hearts. 
Here  is  one  of  his  oracles  which  he  said  the  "  Holy 
Spirit  "  uttered  :  — 

"  Behold  !  man  is  a  lyre,  and  I  flutter  over  him  like 
the  plectrum  "  (or,  as  we  should  say,  the  bow)  "  which 
sets  the  lyre  in  motion.  The  man  sleeps,  but  I  awake. 
Behold  !  it  is  the  Lord  who  changes  the  hearts  of  men, 
and  gives  hearts  to  men." 

More  and  more  opposed,  however,  he  became  more 


44  MONTANUS.  [a.  D.   150. 

violent  and  more  extravagant.  He  called  the  little  town 
of  Pepuza,  near  him,  Jerusalem,  and  said  it  should  be 
the  capital  of  the  New  World.  For  the  spread  of  his 
faith  he  collected  money  largely.  The  bishops  of  the 
largest  churches  in  Asia  Minor  were  indignant  at  the 
new  doctrine,  and  came  up  to  drive  out  the  devils  which 
possessed  Priscilla  and  Maximilla.  But  Maximilla  cried, 
"  They  persecute  me  as  if  I  were  a  wolf  among  sheep. 
I  am  no  wolf ;  I  am  the  Word,  I  am  the  Spirit,  I  am  Vir- 
tue." And  the  bishop  returned,  and  said  her  followers 
would  not  permit  him  to  drive  out  the  devil.  The  bishop 
who  went  to  drive  out  Priscilla's  devil  fared  no  better. 
The  excitement  showed  itself,  at  last,  not  only  in  Phry- 
gia,  but  in  many  other  parts  of  the  Christian  world. 

It  began  always,  probably,  with  a  revival  of  interest 
in  the  promises  of  the  visitations  of  the  Holy  Spirit  to 
the  believers'  hearts.  Those  who  were  thus  moved  in 
many  instances  passed  on  to  a  state  of  really  insane 
ecstasy.  The  Montanist  churches  witnessed  those  ebul- 
litions of  excitement  of  the  nerves  and  of  the  body,  such 
as  seem  to  pass  over  the  world  from  time  to  time  like 
an  epidemic,  always  connected,  more  or  less  closely, 
with  efforts  to  reveal  new  religious  truth.  In  a  church 
at  Carthage,  a  woman  fell  into  a  trance,  so  strange  that 
all  around  supposed  she  would  be  able  to  heal  diseases, 
or  to  predict  the  future,  as  the  heathen  priestesses  did 
in  similar  trances. 

The  external  name  of  this  movement  in  the  Church 
has  not  been  assumed  for  centuries.  Montanus  and 
Maximilla,  it  is  said  by  the  Church  historians,  who  hat- 
ed them,  hung  themselves.     Theodore,  they  say,  was 


A.  D.   150.]  PROPHETS.  45 

lifted  by  the  evil  spirit  in  whom  he  trusted  into  the 
air,  and  then  abandoned,  so  that  he  fell  and  was  killed. 
Such  stories  show  how  little  one  side  only  is  to  be  be- 
lieved in  such  histories.  Fortunately,  in  the  case  of 
the  Montanists,  we  have  something  left  to  us  of  each 
side  of  the  question.  They  certainly  were  not  nearly 
so  black  as  they  were  painted  by  their  worst  enemies. 
In  the  midst  of  the  excitement,  the  Bishop  of  Rome, 
who  was  not  yet  known  as  the  Pope,  hearing  of  the 
disturbance  in  Asia,  wrote  a  letter  to  the  churches 
there,  in  which  he  recognized  the  prophecies  of  Monta- 
nus,  Maximilla,  and  Priscilla  as  inspired.  The  church- 
es in  Asia  cared  very  litde  about  his  opinion,  however. 
Some  of  the  Catholic  historians  say  that  he  afterwards 
changed  his  mind,  and  recalled  these  letters.  The 
Bishop  of  Lyons  wrote  conciliatory  letters,  hoping  to 
reconcile  the  contending  parties.  The  Bishop  of  An- 
tioch  wrote  letters  too.  The  whole  transaction  has  an 
interest  to  us  now,  far  beyond  any  immediate  results. 
It  has  been  repeated,  in  many  forms  not  much  differing 
from  each  other,  in  the  Christian  Church  in  all  ages.  It 
is  to  be  hoped  and  supposed,  indeed,  that  similar  move- 
ments may  often  take  place,  with  a  careful  guard  kept 
upon  their  extravagances.  Just  as  we  see,  in  reading 
the  Old  Testament,  that,  when  the  habit  of  worship  had 
become  dead  and  formal,  spirited  preachers  appeared 
as  prophets  to  shake  up  the  dying  body  of  the  Jewish 
people  and  give  it  some  new  animation,  so  it  has  al- 
ways been,  and,  it  may  be  hoped,  will  always  be,  in  the 
Christian  Church.  When  its  regular  habits  become 
hard  and  dead,  some  earnest  man,  who  in  his  heart 


46  MONTANUS.  [a.  D.   150. 

knows  how  powerful  and  living  is  the  Spirit  of  God, 
starts  up,  preaches,  with  great  extravagance  perhaps, 
and  with  little  learning,  but,  because  he  is  in  earnest, 
and  has  the  power  of  the  Spirit,  moves  many,  and 
awakes  all.  No  matter  if  the  regular  officers  of  the 
Church  of  his  time  oppose  him.  He  wakes  them  up 
just  as  truly  as  if  they  joined  with  him.  Such  men,  in 
later  times,  have  been  Peter  the  Hermit,  Huss,  Wiclif, 
Knox,  George  Fox,  Wesley,  and  Whitefield.  We  shall 
meet  with  some  of  these  as  we  go  on. 

Perhaps  there  has  never  been  any  such  awakener 
of  the  Church  who  has  not  fallen  into  great  absurdities. 
Certainly  Montanus  did.  But  God  wills  that  the  absurd 
ities  shall  die  in  a  few  years,  —  while  the  new,  living 
spirit  which  animates  those  who  hear,  as  it  were  with 
the  same  zeal  that  the  earliest  Christians  had,  works 
effects  which  cannot  die.  And  so  the  world  and  God's 
kingdom  gain  from  every  such  "  new  light,"  who 
comes  to  proclaim  the  worth  of  the  living  Spirit. 

While  the  Church  was  thus  agitated  by  constant  news 
of  Montanus's  movements  and  preaching,  the  Roman 
Empire  was  under  the  government  of  the  two  Anto- 
nines,  whose  reign,  —  partly  because  we  know  little  of 
it,  —  partly  because  of  their  real  excellences,  —  most 
of  all,  because  the  spirit  of  Christianity  acted  upon  it 
before  it  was  publicly  acknowledged,  —  is  universally 
regarded  as  the  finest  example  of  heathen  greatness  in 
command.  The  Christians  did  not  meet  with  as  much 
humanity  from  them  as  they  sometimes  did  from  worse 
Emperors.  The  Christian  power,  too,  was  already  wast- 
ing itself  terribly  in  such  internal  feuds  as  this  about 


A.  D.  150.]  THE  CITY  OF  ALEXANDRIA.  47 

the  Montanists.     But  still   the   faith  was   gaining  hold 
more  and  more  among  the  learned  and  the  rulers. 

We  have  spoken  of  Montanism,  as  an  exhibition,  at 
the  first,  of  Asiatic  enthusiasm.  In  another  chapter 
we  shall  look  at  the  effects  which  philosophy  and  learn- 
ing produced  on  the  new  faith.  To  find  those,  strange 
as  in  this  day  it  seems,  we  shall  turn  to  Africa.  The 
North  of  Africa  was  at  this  time  a  highly  civilized 
region.  In  all  its  principal  parts  the  Christian  faith  was 
well  planted.  As  has  been  said  at  the  beginning  of  this 
chapter,  Egypt  shares  with  Palestine  the  honor  which 
those  places  must  have  where  God  has  revealed  his 
will  more  distinctly  to  the  world.  After  the  destruction 
of  the  Jewish  nation  had  almost  ruined  the  city  of  Je- 
rusalem, the  splendid  city  of  Alexandria,  the  capital 
of  Egypt,  became  for  a  long  period  a  central  point 
of  importance  to  the  Christian  Church.  It  was,  after 
Rome,  the  largest  city  in  the  world,  and  the  commerce 
of  the  East  and  of  the  Mediterranean  made  it  the 
largest  commercial  city.  But  it  was  particularly  dis- 
tinguished as  a  university  city,  for  the  great  advantages 
which  it  offered  to  the  learned,  and  the  inducements  it 
held  out  to  learners.  People  went  there  from  Rome, 
from  Greece,  and  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  indeed, 
to  teach  and  to  learn.  There  was  no  place  where  so 
many  nations  were  represented  among  the  people. 
The  commerce  of  the  place  made  travel  to  it  easy,  and 
gave  to  it  the  wealth  which  endowed  its  museums  and 
libraries.  It  was  something  such  a  place  as  Paris  is 
now,  though  without  any  political  influence  or  any 
political  interests.     People  of  leisure  went  there  to  be 


48  MONTANUS.  [a.  D.  150. 

amused,  while  others  went  to  trade,  and  others  went  to 
study. 

Among  other  teachers  of  the  young  at  this  centre  of 
learning,  Mark,  the  author  of  our  second  Gospel,  was 
established  for  some  years  before  his  death.  He  prob- 
ably wrote  that  Gospel  here.  It  is  so  simple,  it  avoids 
speculation  so  entirely,  dealing  wholly  in  narrative, 
that  the  suggestion  has  been  made,  that  it  was  prepared 
for  the  use  of  young  people  particularly.  It  is  certain 
that  it  contains  all  the  narratives  of  Jesus's  dealings 
with  children,  and  that  this  can  be  said  of  none  of  the 
other  Gospels.  The  school  of  St.  Mark  was  known 
as  the  Catechetical  School,  or  the  school  for  those  who 
were  advancing  from  the  elements  of  Christian  faith  ; 
as  we  might  say,  the  school  of  the  catechized.  After 
St.  Mark's  death,  it  was  continued  by  a  number  of  dis- 
tinguished Christian  teachers,  and  thus,  although  apos- 
tles and  teachers  never  resorted  to  Alexandria  for  the 
same  reason  with  which  Peter  and  Paul  used  to  return 
to  Jerusalem  after  their  travels,  still  Christians  of 
every  rank  in  all  parts  of  the  world,  hearers  and 
teachers,  gradually  came  to  look  on  Alexandria  as  a 
centre  of  Christian  learning. 

At  the  end  of  the  second  century,  seventy  or  eighty 
years,  that  is,  after  the  death  of  Trajan  and  that  of 
Ignatius,  and  forty  or  fifty  after  Montanus  began  to 
preach,  the  principal  teacher  of  the  Christian  school 
in  Alexandria  was  Clement.  A  violent  persecution 
drove  him  from  the  city  in  the  year  202  ;  and  he  con- 
fided the  school  to  a  young  man  named  Origen ;  whose 
life  and  teachings  make  the  subject  of  our  next  chapter. 


A.  D.  202.]  ORIGEN.  49 

CHAPTER    IV. 

ORIGEN,    AND   THE    SCHOOLS    OF    ALEXANDRIA. 

In  the  persecution  of  the  year  202,  many  of  the  Egyp- 
tian Christians  suffered  death.  But  many  of  the  leaders, 
remembering  the  direction  of  Jesus,  "  When  they  perse- 
cute you  in  one  city,  flee  into  another,"  withdrew  from 
the  violence  of  their  enemies.  The  Christian  martyrs 
did  not  always  imitate  this  prudence.  Many  times  they 
really  sought  the  martyr's  death.  Among  those,  how- 
ever, who  at  this  time  withdrew  from  the  quest  made 
for  them  in  Alexandria,  was  Clement,  the  distinguished 
master  of  the  Christian  school.  Among  those  who 
would  have  gladly  suffered  was  a  young  man  named 
Origen,  about  sixteen  years  old.  He  had  six  brothers, 
younger  than  himself.  His  father,  Leonides,  was 
seized,  tried,  and  put  to  death,  only  because  he  was 
a  Christian.  The  boy  Origen  was  eager  to  join  his 
father  and  to  share  his  fate.  He  insisted  on  going  to 
his  prison  ;  and  his  mother  only  kept  him  concealed  at 
home  by  hiding  his  clothes.  Here,  imprisoned  by  her 
affection,  the  brave  boy  wrote  to  his  father,  "  See  that 
thou  dost  not  change  thy  mind  for  our  sakes." 

Out  of  such  boys  the  young  Church  made  its  heroes 
All  Leonides's  property  was  seized  by  the  government 
Origen  and  his  brothers,  and  their  mother,  were  left  des 
titute.  Among  Christians,  however,  they  found  friends 
Origen  was  received  into  the  house  of  a  wealthy  Chris 
tian  lady,  who  was  glad  to  care   for  those  who  were 

NO.    VIII.  5 


50  oraGEN.  [a.  d.  204. 

seeking  the  truths  of  religion,  and  surrounded  herself 
with  literary  men.  Origen  had  already  distinguished 
himself  in  his  zeal  for  study.  His  father  had  taught 
him  daily  to  repeat  a  portion  of  the  New  Testament. 
He  had  taken  great  pleasure  in  this,  and  always  in- 
quired about  the  full  meaning  of  the  passages  he 
learned.  In  his  new  home  the  extent  of  his  acquisi- 
tions, though  he  was  so  young,  gained  attention.  He 
says  he  sold  his  old  books  of  grammar  and  other  ele- 
mentary studies,  which  had  not  been  taken  from  him, 
to  a  man  who  allowed  him  a  daily  payment  of  four 
oboli  (about  six  cents)  for  them,  —  to  last  some  years. 
So  frugal  was  he,  that  he  made  this  little  income  cover 
all  his  own  needs.  And  as  a  teacher,  first  of  Greek 
and  then  of  philosophy,  in  which  he  included  Chris- 
tian doctrine,  he  was  able  to  gain  a  support  for  his 
mother  and  his  brothers. 

To  this  young  man,  when  he  was  hardly  eighteen 
years  old,  the  learned  Clement  sent  from  his  exile  to  in- 
trust the  care  of  the  college  or  school  which  he  had  been 
obliged  to  leave.  And  although  this  school  had  begun 
by  being  a  school  for  children,  it  had  attracted  in  that 
city  of  learning  so  much  attention,  that  older  scholars 
resorted  to  it,  and  its  teachers  and  pupils  went  into  the 
discussion  of  more  difficult  subjects  than  children  could 
have  managed.  Origen,  young  as  he  was  when  he  un- 
dertook this  charge,  grew  up  in  it  to  make  his  school 
distinguished  among  the  Alexandrian  places  of  learn- 
ing. He  was  so  resolute  a  worker,  that  he  was  known 
by  the  name  of  Adamant.  He  was  the  most  laborious 
student,  perhaps,  of  whom  we  have  any  account.     His 


A.  D.  204.]        THE  EGYPTIAN  GODS.  51 

friends  said  he  was  made  of  brass,  so  easily  did  he 
digest  the  mass  of  reading  which  he  found  at  hand  in 
the  immense  libraries  of  Alexandria. 

It  is  impossible  to  give  here  a  full  account  of  the 
other  schools  which  were  rivals  of  his,  —  but  there  was 
not  one  of  them  which  did  not  affect  his  studies,  or 
those  of  his  scholars,  either  in  controversy  or  in  their 
efforts  to  harmonize.  The  old  Egyptian  faith,  which 
was  taught  by  the  priests  to  the  learned,  as  a  secret, 
still  existed,  and  was  still  studied  there.  The  unlearned 
looked  amazed,  as  they  still  do,  on  the  monuments  cov- 
ered with  pictures  of  gods  with  men's  heads,  and  dogs' 
and  apes'  heads  or  paws.  The  priests,  to  each  other 
and  to  their  pupils,  explained  these  things.  The  igno- 
rant worshipped  many  gods  under  many  names,  as 
Anubis,  Isis,  Thoth,  Phthah,  and  many  others.  But 
the  priests,  who  held  and  taught  the  secrets  of  the  re- 
ligion, believed  in  one  deity  alone.  When  they  wor- 
shipped one  or  another  of  these  almost  countless  gods, 
"  they  really  addressed  themselves  directly  to  the  sole 
Author  of  the  universe,  under  that  particular  fqj'm."  * 
The  number  of  such  forms  had  been  increasing  under 
an  Egyptian  system  for  more  than  two  thousand  years. 

That  system  of  different  forms  of  gods  derived  from 
one  original,  is  in  all  the  ancient  religions.  It  is  very 
obscure  in  part,  but  may  in  part  be  explained.  Those 
who  try  to  go  to  the  beginning  of  its  explanation  say, 
that  it  is  impossible  to  think  of  God,  existing  wholly 
alone,  without  feeling  that  he  thinks  of  something.  We 
can    conceive    of   God    existing    without   any    created 

■*  These  words  are  Sir  J.  G.  Wilkinson's. 


52  OEIGEN.  [a.  d.  204. 

worlds.  But  we  must  feel  that  he  is  intelligent  always  ; 
—  that  the  Infinite  is  always  engaged  in  meditation,  if 
not  in  action. 

Now  the  early  philosophers  loved  very  much  to 
speculate  on  this  beginning  of  existence,  —  before  the 
world,  or  the  created  heavens  were.  Then,  they  said, 
God  meditated  on  himself ;  —  there  was  nothing  beside 
to  engage  his  intelligence.  And  all  existence,  there- 
fore, might  be  comprised  in  the  words  which  described, 
1st,  God  as  thinking;  2d,  God  as  thought  of;  and 
3d,  the  process  of  thought, —  by  which  God  thought  of 
himself.  These  words,  or  these  ideas,  were  the  only 
three  words  or  ideas  which  could  be  formed  of  the 
Beginning,  when  God  was  Alone  and  All. 

It  is  a  very  obscure  speculation.  But  they  loved  it 
all  the  more  because  it  was  obscure.  When,  then,  they 
went  on  to  tell  how  God  made  the  world,  —  how  from 
him  other  gods  descended,  —  it  was  always  in  the 
same  form,  and  almost  always  with  some  recognition 
of  this  threefold  existence  in  the  very  Beginning. 

The  Egyptian  priests  had  a  fear,  which  is  sometimes 
perceived  in  modern  preaching,  that  they  should  de- 
grade the  Infinite  God,  if  they  supposed  that  he  busied 
himself  in  such  little  matters  as  the  creation  of  this 
world.  They  therefore  supposed  that  the  Creator  of 
the  world  "  created  himself  out  of"  the  Origmal  Being. 
In  an  old  Egyptian  writing,  describing  their  faith  at  a 
time  before  Greek  philosophy  began,  this  mysterious 
process  is  thus  described  :  — 

"  The  Original  Being  —  is  established.  He  is  the 
Exemplar  of  that  God  who  is  the  father  of  himself  ana 


A.  D.  204.]  PICTUKES    OF    GODS.  53 

self-begotten  and  the  only  father  and  the  truly  good. 
For  he  is  something  greater,  and  the  First ;  —  the  Foun- 
tain of  all  things  and  the  Root  of  all  primary  intelli- 
gible forms.  Out  of  this  One,  the  self- ruling  God 
made  liimself  shine  forth^  wherefore  ^le  is  the  father  of 
himself  and  self-ruling ;  for  he  is  the  First  Principle 
and  God  of  gods." 

That  is  to  say,  the  Egyptian  faith  supposed  that  in 
some  way  the  Supreme  God  of  our  world  made  him- 
self from  the  Original  Being.  The  phrase,  it  is  true, 
is  one  which  men,  while  they  have  human  minds,  can- 
not comprehend.  But,  in  like  manner,  the  Egyptian 
religion  went  on,  and  supposed  that  for  especial  pur- 
poses lesser  gods  were  created,  or  created  themselves, 
in  succession,  from  this  Supreme  God  of  this  world. 
As  they  expressed  to  the  common  people  this  difficult 
speculation,  they  showed  tlicse  successive  gods  as  the 
children,  each  one,  of  a  male  and  female  god  in  tlie 
grade  above  it.  Each  one  in  turn  is  shown,  in  that 
popular  explanation,  as  the  father  or  mother  of  one 
below.  In  their  own  books,  however,  which  the  com- 
mon people  could  not  read,  they  spoke  of  these  suc- 
cessive gods  as  being  still  the  same  in  substance  with 
those  from  which  they  were  created.  And  as  each 
god  was  supposed  to  know  every  thought  of  each  other, 
—  to  be  everywhere,  and  in  all  time,  —  it  would  be 
difficult,  indeed,  to  keep  up  a  distinction  between  beings 
so  exactly  alike. 

The  distinction  was  better  preserved  to  the  common 
people  than  to  the  priests,  though  the  oneness  of  the 
gods  was  sacrificed  to  the  smne  degree.     As  has  been 
5* 


54  ORIGEN.  [a.  d.  204. 

said,  in  all  their  worship  the  priests  worshipped  the 
Original  Being.  But  on  the  temples  he  was  nowhere 
represented.  One  of  the  old  Egyptian  authors  says  :  — 
"  It  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  God  and  to  speak  of 
him  in  words.  We  cannot  describe  by  material  means 
what  is  immaterial ;  it  is  hard  to  ally  what  is  eternal  to 
that  which  is  subject  to  time.  One  passes,  the  other  ex- 
ists for  ever.  The  one  is  a  conception  of  the  mind,  the 
other  is  a  reality.  That  which  can  be  known  by  the 
eyes  and  senses,  as  a  visible  body,  can  be  expressed  by 
language;  but  what  is  incorporeal,  invisible,  immate- 
rial, and  without  form,  cannot  be  expressed  by  our 
senses."  They  attempted,  therefore,  to  represent  to 
the  eye  only  the  derived  gods  of  the  lower  stages  of 
being.  They  represented,  almost  always,  sets  of  three 
gods  together ;  the  father,  mother,  and  child.  A  sec- 
ond temple  would  show  the  child  side  by  side  with  an- 
other god  of  his  grade,  and  with  a  lesser  one,  represent- 
ed smaller,  as  a  child  of  theirs.  The  gods  are  thus  al- 
most always  exhibited  in  threes.  Such  representations 
are  still  to  be  seen  among  the  hieroglyphics  and  pictures. 
This  was  the  Egyptian  statement  of  that  process  )>f 
gradual  creation,  which,  in  fact,  cannot  be  explained  by- 
men.  In  India  there  was  a  like  statement,  always  show- 
ing the  many  gods  who  were  presented  to  the  common 
people  in  groups  of  three.  The  heathen  philosophers, 
who,  under  the  name  of  Platonists,  taught  in  Alexandria, 
in  Origen  and  Clement's  time,  took  a  similar  idea  of  a 
triple  nature  of  God.  And  they  made  use  of  some 
passages  in  the  works  of  the  great  philosopher  Plato,  to 
show  that  he  held  similar  views. 


A,  D.  204.]       CHRISTIAN  DREAD  OF  SPECULATION.  55 

Meanwhile,  the  old  Roman  and  Greek  gods  grew 
more  and  more  ridiculous  to  all.  Pliny's  letter  has 
shown  us  how  their  temples  were  deserted.  Many  of 
their  old  worshippers  had  become  Christians.  In  the 
unsettled  state  of  opinion  on  religious  matters,  many 
others  went  wildly  into  such  speculations  as  these,  of 
which  we  have  given  some  specimen.  Those  men  who 
carried  such  wild  flights  farthest  called  themselves 
Knowing  Ones,  or  Gnostics. 

But  the  Christians  generally  dreaded  their  fancyings. 
For  the  Christian  Church  often  had  to  take  the  credit  of 
them.  They  would  profess  to  be,  in  some  sense.  Chris- 
tian believers.  Those  whose  name  they  took  saw  the 
danger  of  that  connection.  Indeed,  the  early  Christians, 
to  a  time  long  after  Trajan  and  Ignatius,  and  that  gener- 
ation which  had  seen  the  Lord  or  his  disciples,  dreaded 
the  effects  of  much  study  of  books.  Their  preachers 
would  not  write  their  own  sermons.  They  discounte- 
nanced human  learning.  For  this  reason,  among  others, 
we  have  but  few  remnants  of  Christian  writings  for  the 
first  hundred  years  after  Jesus's  death. 

They  disliked,  and  the  Jews  hated,  these  speculations 
about  the  nature  of  God.  Moses  had  made  the  Jews 
hold  for  ever  to  the  doctrine  that  God  is  one  and  indivis- 
ible. And  the  Jewish  Christians,  to  the  last  moment  we 
hear  of  them  as  a  separate  community,  retained  a  great 
dread  lest  this  doctrine  should  be  abandoned,  in  any 
way. . 

There  is  no  doubt  that  heathens  converted  to  Chris- 
tianity had  the  same  dread,  though,  as  more  and  more 
learned  men  became  Christians,  they  had  less  fear  of 


56  ORIGEN.  [a.  d.  204, 

the  evil  effects  of  human  literature  and  philosophy. 
When,  in  their  persecutions,  they  were  brought  to  trial, 
they  were  always  charged  with  being  atheists,  godless 
men  ;  because  they  worshipped  a  God  who  could  not 
be  seen,  heard,  or  felt.  They  answered,  of  course,  that, 
though  their  Infinite  God  was  invisible,  yet  he  had  un- 
veiled himself,  or  revealed  himself  in  his  Son.  Jesus 
was  the  power  of  God,  and  the  wisdom  of  God.  In  the 
sense  in  which  the  Jews  called  those  "  gods  to  whom 
the  word  of  God  had  come,"  he  might  be  called  a  god. 
All  that  he  spoke  was  God's  word  to  the  world.  All 
that  he  did  was  God's  deed  to  the  world.  For  he  con- 
stantly said  that  he  did  nothing  of  himself.  Yet  the 
Christian  writers,  using  such  language  at  times,  spoke 
of  God  himself  as  invisible,  and  supreme.  They  did 
not  answer  the  charge  of  atheism  by  saying  that  their 
God  had  walked  the  earth  in  human  form.  When  such 
a  charge  was  made  to  Minucius  Felix,  he  answered  :  — 
"  But  you  say  we  worship  a  God  whom  we  cannot 
show  to  others,  nor  see  ourselves.  Yes,  because  we 
can  perceive  and  feel  him,  but  cannot  see  him,  there- 
fore we  believe  that  he  is  God.  For  in  his  works,  and 
in  all  the  agencies  of  his  world,  we  trace  his  ever-pres- 
ent efficacy ;  in  thunder,  in  lightning,  in  clear  weather. 
Do  not  be  surprised  not  to  see  God.  Every  thing  is 
agitated  and  borne  on  by  the  wind,  yet  the  wind  is  no 
object  of  sight.  By  means  of  the  sun  it  is  that  we  see, 
but  we  cannot  look  into  the  sun.  It  repels  and  disables 
the  vision,  and  if  you  gaze  long,  the  sight  is  quenched. 
What!  will  you  look  at  the  Maker  of  the  sun,  at  the 
Fountain  of  light,  when  you  avert  your  eye  from  his 


A.   D.  204,]  JUSTIN    MARTYR.  57 

lightnings,  when  you  hide  away  from  the  reverberation 
of  his  thunder  ?  Will  you  look  upon  God  with  the  out- 
ward eyes,  when  you  cannot  so  much  as  see  or  appre- 
hend that  spirit  of  your  own,  by  which  you  live  and 
speak  ?  " 

So  clear  is  it,  that  among  the  Christians  for  more 
than  a  hundred  years  after  Jesus's  death  there  was  not 
the  doctrine  which  was  stated  by  Athanasius  or  Hilary, 
two  hundred  years  later.  Yet,  that  "  Our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  is  God  of  God,  Light  of  Light,  very  God  of  very 
God,  begotten,  not  made,  being  of  one  substance  with 
the  Father,"  —  this  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Catholic  Church 
now.  But,  as  the  most  distinguished  author  in  that 
Church  in  our  time  and  language  *  says,  it  is  not  to  be 
made  out  from  the  Bible,  or  the  Fathers  of  the  first 
three  centuries.  He  sustains  it  on  later  authorities. 
Those  Christians,  who  made  no  boast  of  learning,  made 
no  effort  to  describe  the  position  or  precise  nature  of 
our  Lord.  It  was  as  impossible,  of  course,  then,  as  now, 
to  say  in  what  way  God's  spirit  filled  Jesus's  heart.  But 
then  Christian  men  agreed  to  differ  on  this  point,  know- 
ing that  it  was  one  on  which  human  language  must  be 
doubtful.  Justin,  who  wrote  only  a  hundred  and  ten 
years  after  the  crucifixion,  himself  supposed  that  Jesus 
was  the  angel  who  appeared  to  Moses  in  the  bush ;  but 
he  added,  with  great  sincerity,  in  his  letter  to  the  Em- 
peror of  Rome  :  "  If  I  am  not  able  to  prove  that  Jesus 
existed  before  his  birth  in  Palestine,  it  will  not  therefore 
follow  that  he  is  not  the  Christ.     I  may  say,  then,  if  it 

*  Dr.  Newman. 


58  OKIGEN.  [a.  d.  204. 

be  proved  that  he  is  a  man  born  of  man,  that  I  was  de- 
ceived as  to  his  preexistence,  and  that  he  was  elected 
to  be  the  Messiah."  Learned  and  unlearned  Christians, 
Jewish  or  Gentile  Christians,  were  as  willing  then,  as  all 
Christians,  of  whatever  name,  are  now,  to  own  Jesus  as 
the  power  of  God  and  the  wisdom  of  God.  It  was  then 
as  impossible  as  it  is  now  to  say  in  any  man's  life 
where  God's  action  ends,  and  where  the  man's  action 
begins.  So  it  was  as  hard  then  as  now  to  say  where 
in  Jesus's  life  the  power  of  God  ended  or  began.  While 
all  Christians  then  agreed  in  speaking  of  God  as  su- 
preme,—  of  Christ  as  coming  from  him,  —  their  lan- 
guage, when  they  began  to  study  and  to  write,  varied, 
though  not  as  widely,  still  in  the  same  way,  as  Chris- 
tian language  does  now,  as  to  the  nature  of  Christ,  and 
how  far  he  shared  the  nature  of  God. 

Turning,  however,  to  Origen,  and  the  teachers  of  the 
Christian  school  in  Egypt,  we  find  they  had  no  dread 
of  human  learning.  They  used  the  best  training  they 
could  find.  And,  not  willing  to  lose  the  name  of  the 
Knoicing,  or  Gnostics,  they  said  that  Christians  who  ad- 
vanced in  faith  became  true  Gnostics.  They  owned 
that  the  simple  faith  of  a  Christian  might  be  wholly  un- 
accompanied by  any  knowledge  of  these  difficult  specu- 
lations. But  they  said  very  truly,  that  every  faithful 
Christian,  as  he  grew  in  grace,  gained  in  his  own  heart 
knowledge  of  the  power  of  the  Spirit.  Such  men,  they 
said,  became  "  Gnostics,'''  And  then,  to  win,  if  they 
could,  heathen  Gnostics,  or  Jews,  or  Egyptians,  to  the 
Christian  doctrine,  they  went  on  to  show  its  similarity 
in  some  of  its  more  difficult  speculations  with  the  spec 


A.  D.  204.]  THE    TRINITY.  59 

ulations  of  the  other  systems.  So  Clement  and  Origen 
pressed  with  more  zeal  than  they  would  otherwise  have 
thought  worth  while,  the  fact  that  their  faith  too  was 
threefold  ;  that  they  believed  in  God,  in  Jesus,  and  in 
the  present  power  of  God's  Spirit.  Jesus,  indeed,  was 
the  Word  of  God  ;  and  this  was  the  very  name  given  to 
one  of  the  principles  of  the  triad  of  the  Platonists  and  of 
some  Gnostics.  Such  similarities  the  Christian  philoso- 
phers loved  to  dwell  upon.  It  was  natural  that  they 
should  push  them  to  the  utmost.  It  was  as  natural  that 
the  heathen  whom  they  won  by  such  parallels  should 
push  them  farther  still.  At  the  very  same  time,  in  Alex- 
andria, the  Egyptian  priests  were  expounding  the  old 
Egyptian  trinity  ;  the  followers  of  Plato  were  making 
a  new  Platonic  trinity ;  the  philosophic  Jews,  leaving 
the  orthodox  Jewish  faith,  were  reviving  the  specula- 
tions of  Philo  on  Plato's  trinity.  And  in  the  midst  of 
these  men  were  Origen  and  Clement,  trying  to  win  them 
to  Christ,  and  to  baptize  them  in  the  name  of  the  Father, 
and  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit.  It  is  not  wonderful, 
for  they  were  not  more  than  human,  that  they  bent  to- 
wards the  views  \vith  which  they  were  so  entangled. 

It  was,  indeed,  under  such  circumstances  that  a  doc- 
trine of  the  Trinity,  somewhat  resembling  that  which 
three  hundred  years  afterwards  generally  prevailed, 
was  first  stated  in  Christian  writings.  It  was  stated  for 
the  learned  alone.  "The  simple,  the  ignorant,  th6  un- 
learned," says  Tertullian,  a  Christian  father  writing  at 
this,  time,  "  who  are  always  a  majority  of  believers,  are 
horror-struck  at  this  economy,  imagining  that  this  num- 
ber and  disposition  of  the  Trinity  is  a  division  of  the 


60  ORIGEN.  [a.  d.  204. 

unity."  And  Origen  says,  that  "  to  the  carnal  they 
taught  the  Gospel  in  a  literal  way,  preaching  Jesus  Christ 
and  him  crucified  ;  but  to  persons  farther  advanced,  and 
burning  with  love  for  divine  celestial  wisdom,  they  com- 
municated the  Logos.'''' 

The  statement  of  the  Alexandrian  teachers  of  this 
time  may  be  summed  up  in  these  words  of  Clement : 
"The  most  perfect  nature,  the  most  holy,  supreme, 
royal,  and  beneficent,  is  that  of  the  Son ;  and  it  ap- 
proaches nearest  to  that  of  the  Almighty."  Again  : 
"  Our  Teacher  is  the  God  Jesus,  the  Word,  which  is  the 
guide  of  all  the  human  race  ;  the  God  which  loves  men." 
Again :  "  God  hates  nothing,  nor  does  the  Word ;  for 
both  these  are  one,  that  is,  God."  These  are  his  ex- 
treme statements,  as  selected  by  an  author*  who  was 
trying  to  show  that  he  held  the  view  afterwards  held  by 
the  Catholic  Church.  But  that  view  had  not  yet  come 
into  being.  And  when  it  did,  its  supporters  denounced 
Clement  and  Origen  as  blasphemers,  because  they  did 
not  admit  it. 

There  is  no  more  agreeable  way  to  show,  not  the 
learned,  but  the  popular  Christian  theology  of  their  time, 
than  by  copying  this  little  hymn,  which  Clement  proba- 
bly wrote.     It  is  a  Hymn  of  Children  to  Christ. 

Thy  children,  free  from  guile,  awake, 
Like  saints  to  praise,  and  purely  hymn 
The  Christ  who  saves  the  child  ! 

Thou  Curb  of  untamed  steeds, 
Thou  Wing  of  fearless  birds, 


A.  D.  204.]  Clement's  hymn.  61 

Sure  Rudder  of  the  young, 
Shepherd  of  royal  sheep  ! 

Thou  King  of  saints,  Almighty  Word 

Of  God  most  high. 
Of  wisdom  chief,  our  stay  in  grief. 

Gracious  eternally  ! 
O  Christ !  the  Saviour  of  our  race, 
The  wing  which  wafts  to  heaven. 
The  Helm,  the  Curb,  Sower,  and  Shepherd 

Of  the  flock  untaught  before  ;  — 
Fisher  of  men  whom  God  has  saved. 
Who  with  the  bait  of  happy  life 

Dost  draw  thy  fish 
From  angry  waves  of  wicked  seas  ;  — 
Lead  us,  thou  Shepherd  of  the  sheep  divine. 
Lead  us,  thou  holy  King  of  children  undepraved. 

O  steps  of  Christ,  our  path  to  heaven  ! 

O  Word  Eternal  !     Power  untold  ! 
O  Light  unfading  !   Source  of  grace 

And  Fount  of  truth  ! 
Christ  Jesus,  Light  divine  of  those 

Who  praise  their  God, 
We  children,  fed  with  dewy  grace, 

By  thy  bride  wisdom. 
We  little  ones  together  sing. 
Thus  simply  sing  praise  undefiled 

And  hymns  unstained 

To  Christ  our  King  ;  — 
Such  pious  tribute  give  the  mighty  Child 

Who  taught  us  how  to  live. 
NO.  VIII.  6 


62  MARY  OF  NUMIDIA.         [a.  D.  202-250. 

Ye  people  called, 
Ye  born  in  Christ, 
A  band  of  peace, 
Join  all  to  praise  the  peace  of  God. 

NOTE    TO    CHAPTER    IV. 

Young  readers  may  illustrate  the  last  half  of  the  second  century 
by  reading  Palfrey's  Lowell  Lectures,  Vol.  II.  Lect.  11  and  12. 
Persons  old  enough  to  read  this  book  will  in  many  cases  know 
Latin  enough  to  read  with  ease 

Minucius  Felix's  Apology,  quoted  above,  which  with  many  other 
similar  works,  in  one  volume,  may  be  bought  for  half  a  dollar  in  a 
Leipsic  edition.  Translations  of  these  fathers  will  be  found  in 
large  libraries. 

There  are  many  recent  books  on  the  Egyptian  philosophy  and 
customs.  To  persons  who  can  read  French,  Champollion-Figeac's 
"  L'Egypte,"  published  in  a  cheap  edition,  by  Didot,  in  1840,  is  still 
the  best  of  the  shorter  books  on  the  subject. 

Rev.  \V.  B.  Greene's  pamphlet  on  the  Trinity. 


CHAPTER   V. 

MARY  OF  NUMIDIA. MARION. CHRISTIAN  LIFE. 

NuMiDiA  was  a  province  in  the  North  of  Africa,  in 
the  region  we  now  call  the  Barbary  States.  The  life 
of  Mary,  a  Christian  woman  there,  may  be  so  told,  per- 
haps, in  this  lesson,  as  to  show  what  were  the  ways  of 
Christians,  in  domestic  life  and  in  their  meetings,  in 
those  days.  There  is  but  little  which  we  can  tell  of 
her.     But  we  will  tell  of  her,  besides  the  particular  in- 


A.  D.  2()2-250.]         MARY    BAPTIZED.  63 

cidents  of  her  life,  what  we  might  of  any  Christian  child 
or  woman  of  her  country  and  time.  There  is  much  in 
it  that  differs  from  our  customs,  or  from  the  customs  of 
any  Christian  nation  now. 

Mary  was  born  about  the  time  spoken  of  in  the  last 
chapter,  when  Clement  was  driven  from  Egypt,  and 
Origen  took  the  care  of  the  Catechetical  School.  But 
we  do  not  know  that  her  father  and  mother,  who  were 
Christians,  suffered  under  any  of  the  public  persecutions 
of  their  times.  The  little  girl  was  but  a  few  weeks  old, 
when,  with  their  friends,  they  took  her  to  the  minister, 
that  he  might  baptize  her.  The  custom  was,  that  all 
persons  who  were  not  sick  should  be  wholly  dipped  in 
water,  as  those  were  who  were  baptized  in  Jesus's  time 
in  the  Jordan.  So,  on  the  appointed  day,  little  Mary, 
and  the  others  who  were  baptized  with  her,  were  taken 
to  the  baptistery,  as  the  place  provided  was  called,  and 
there  the  minister  baptized  her.  The  service  was  sim- 
ple. He  made  a  prayer,  dipped  the  little  infant  in  wa- 
ter, and  said,  "  I  baptize  thee  in  the  name  of  the  Father, 
and  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit."  He  gave  to  her 
her  name,  "  Mary,"  and  kissed  her,  and  said,  "  Peace 
to  you,"  and  the  glad  parents  carried  their  little  one 
away. 

As  she  grew  up,  they  took  more  pains  with  her  learn- 
ing, and  she  saw  that  other  Christian  parents  took  more 
pains  with  their  children,  than  any  of  her  little  play- 
mates enjoyed  who  were  not  Christians.  She  was  taught 
to  read  and  write  as  soon  as  she  was  old  enough.  Her 
copies  were  from  the  Psalms,  and  she  read  passages 
from  the  Old  and  New  Testament.     Her  father  and 


64  MARY  OF  NUMIDIA.       [a.  D.  202-250. 

mother  went  about  among  all  the  people  of  the  town, 
without  secluding  themselves  from  those  who  were  not 
Christians ;  but  Mary  soon  learned  to  distinguish  a  dif- 
ference, even  in  appearance,  not  easy  to  describe,  be- 
tween their  Christian  and  their  heathen  friends.  Thus, 
in  her  father's  house,  the  furniture  was  not  so  showy, 
though  it  was  quite  as  convenient,  as  in  their  next  neigh- 
bors'. Neither  he,  nor  her  mother,  nor  the  little  girl 
herself,  were  ever  dressed  in  garments  which  could  at- 
tract attention  from  shape  or  color.  Still  they  wore  no 
special  Christian  uniform.  There  was  more  difference 
at  meal-times  between  them  and  the  heathen  neighbors, 
than  at  any  other  time.  They  were  not  poor,  but  the 
table  was  always  provided  very  simply,  and  without  any 
of  the  luxuries  which  Mary  saw  on  the  tables  of  other 
persons,  when  she  was  on  visits  away  from  home.  Her 
father  sometimes  drank  the  wine  which  they  made  in 
their  own  vineyard,  but  the  children  and  their  mother 
never  did,  and  she  observed  that  he  used  it  very  spar- 
ingly. When  they  were  seated  at  dinner,  he  always 
made  a  prayer  to  God,  thanking  him  for  his  bounties, 
and  asking  for  his  blessing.  As  the  meal  went  on, 
some  one  who  sat  apart  read  to  them  from  the  Scrip- 
tures. And  when  it  was  over,  they  gathered  together, 
the  father  read  a  few  verses,  and  then  taught  the  chil- 
dren some  prayer  or  Scripture  lesson,  and  before  they 
parted  they  sang  a  hymn.  So  different  was  the  daily 
gathering  of  the  family  from  the  huny  of  our  meeting 
and  parting.  Out  of  doors,  in  those  days,  there  was 
seldom  a  chance  for  religious  conversation,  and  there 
was  even  danger  in  religious  confession.     But  in  the 


A.  D.  202-250.]  TRAVELLERS.  65 

house  there  was  safety ;  the  domestic  apartments  were 
guarded  from  intrusion  in  those  countries  then,  as  they 
are  now.  And  these  private  devotions  were  the  more 
dear  because  the  dangers  of  persecution,  and  the  neces- 
sary secrecy  of  the  pubhc  services,  made  attendance  on 
them  less  frequent  and  certain. 

Mary's  Httle  companions  sometimes  wondered  why 
there  were  so  many  strangers  who  came  and  staid  at 
her  house  in  their  travels.  This  was  because  the  cus- 
tom was  universal  by  which  Christians  entertained 
other  Christians  who  were  away  from  home,  —  from 
Rome,  from  Greece,  from  Asia,  or  Egypt ;  whatever 
Christian  in  travelling  came  to  their  town  always  found 
out  a  Christian  household,  introduced  himself  as  a 
Christian,  and  received  from  them  their  best  hospitality. 
In  this  way  they  learned  much  of  the  customs  and  his- 
tory of  those  distant  lands,  —  and  such  intercourse  sup- 
plied to  the  children,  particularly,  a  great  deal  of  infor- 
mation such  as  we  gain  from  books  of  travel,  or  from 
letters,  or  from  newspapers. 

Mary  did  not  begin  to  go  to  meeting  as  early  as  chil- 
dren do  with  us.  For,  even  in  the  best  times,  the 
meeting  together  of  Christians  was  prohibited  by  the 
laws  against  meetings  of  citizens,  —  and  therefore  they 
could  not  conduct  their  services  in  a  public  way.  They 
used  to  meet  on  the  Lord's  day,  therefore,  before  light 
in  the  morning,  and  after  sunset  at  night.  It  was  hardly 
Sun-day  to  them.  When  Mary  was  old  enough  to 
understand  what  worship  was,  and  old  enough  to  be 
trusted  with  the  secrets,  which,  if  a  careless  child  be- 
trayed, many  Christians  might  be  exposed  to  persecu- 


6G  MARY    OF    NUMIDIA.       [a.  D.  202-250. 

tion,  her  father  took  her  early  one  Sunday  morning  to 
the  church  where  the  Christians  of  the  town  assembled. 

It  had  not  been  built  for  a  church,  and,  in  its  out- 
ward aspect,  had  nothing  to  distinguish  it  from  the  other 
buildings  round.  As  Mary  went  in,  her  mother  kept 
her  with  her,  and  they  went  and  sat  with  other  women 
and  girls,  who  w-ere  by  themselves.  Her  father  and 
her  elder  brothers  sat  opposite  them,  on  the  other  side 
of  the  building.  As  Mary  looked  round,  she  could 
see  the  minister,  whom  she  knew,  opposite  the  door  by 
which  they  had  entered,  standing  in  a  sort  of  pulpit. 
Behind  him  was  a  table  covered  with  a  white  cloth,  and 
on  this,  Mary  had  been  told,  were  the  preparations  for 
the  Communion.  Near  the  door  were  some  persons 
together  who  were  penitents,  undergoing  some  disci- 
pline for  offences.  Between  them  and  the  congrega- 
tion were  some  converts  who  were  not  yet  baptized. 

The  service  began  with  a  simple  hymn,  and  Mary 
was  glad  to  find  that  she  could  join  in  it,  —  for  it  was 
one  they  were  used  to  sing  at  home.  The  minister 
then  read  from  the  Old  Testament  and  from  the  New  ; 
and,  a  part  of  the  time,  a  younger  person,  called  a 
reader,  read  the  Scripture.  When  he  came  to  the 
passage  from  the  Gospel,  he  said,  "Stand  up,  —  the 
Gospel  will  now  be  read,"  and  began  with  the  words, 
"  Thus  saith  the  Lord."  All  the  people  stood  while 
the  Gospel  was  read.  Then  the  minister  said  to  the 
people,  "  Peace  be  with  you,"  and  delivered  a  sermon 
to  them  on  the  Gospel  which  had  been  read.  And  it 
would  happen  sometimes  that  other  brethren  would 
speak  also.     If  they  had  a  letter  from  another  church, 


A.  D.  202-250.]  CATECHIZING.  67 

it  was  read  to  the  people.  While  this  service  went  on, 
the  speaker  sat  down,  and  the  audience  stood.  For 
this  was  the  custom  in  Africa,  —  as  the  speaker's  sit- 
ting was  in  Palestine.* 

At  the  end  of  the  sermon,  one  of  the  officers  of  the 
church  bade  all  faithless  to  retire.  Then  the  minister 
offered  a  very  short  prayer,  as  nearly  as  possible  in  the 
w^ords  of  Scripture.  He  prayed  for  all  the  believers, — 
for  the  young  persons  who  were  learning  the  doctrines, 
and  had  not  been  baptized,  —  for  the  penitents  who 
were  passing  through  any  discipline.  As  these  last 
were  spoken  of,  they  left  the  church  quietly ;  and  those 
of  the  congregation  remained  for  the  service  of  Com- 
munion. 

Mary  partook  with  her  mother  in  this  service.  All 
young  people  did,  who  had  been  baptized  and  educated 
in  the  Christian  religion.  Yet  she  did  not  the  less  o-o, 
at  the  proper  times,  to  be  catechized.  Here  she  met 
with  many  who  had  not  been  baptized,  who  had  only 
lately  been  interested  in  the  persecuted  faith.  There 
were  some  persons  quite  old,  whom  the  deacons  and 
the  minister  instructed  with  her,  in  the  simple  lessons 
which  were  necessary  before  their  baptism.  Mary  had 
learned  all  of  these  at  home.  They  were  the  ten  com- 
mandments, a  creed  which  the  minister  explained  to 
them,t  and  the  Lord's  prayer. 

After  the   converts  had  learned  these,  and   seemed 

*  See  Luke  iv.  20,  21. 

t  What  particular  form  the  church  in  this  toAvn  in  Numidia 
used,  cannot  be  told.  But  it  could  not  liave  been  unlike  that 
which  is  known  as  the  Apostles'  Creed. 


68  MARY    OF    NUMIDIA.        [a.  D.  202-250. 

to  understand  and  really  believe  them,  they  were  bap- 
tized, and  afterwards  took  their  place  with  the  congre- 
gation. 

Before  they  parted,  at  the  end  of  the  service,  they 
all  said, — 

"  To  God  the  Father,  and  his  Son  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  with  the  Holy  Spirit,  be  honor  and  might  for 
ever  and  ever.     Amen." 

The  service  of  the  Communion  varied  but  little  from 
the  forms  common  now.  The  oldest  description  we 
have  of  it  —  of  a  hundred  years  before  Mary's  time 
—  will  show  probably  quite  nearly  what  it  was  then. 

"  After  prayer,"  says  Justin  Martyr,  '' bread,  wine, 
and  water  are  brought  in.  The  president  of  the  meet- 
ing again  prays  according  to  his  ability,  and  gives 
thanks,  to  which  the  people  respond.  Amen.  After 
this,  the  bread,  wine,  and  water  are  distributed  to  those 
present,  and  the  deacons  carry  portions  to  such  as  are 
necessarily  detained  from  the  meeting.  Those  who 
are  able  and  willing  contribute  what  they  please  in 
money,  which  is  given  to  the  president  of  the  meeting, 
and  is  appropriated  to  the  support  of  widows  and  or- 
phans, the  sick,  the  poor,  and  whomsoever  is  neces- 
sitous." 

Frequently,  when  there  was  an  opportunity,  they 
met  on  week-days  for  religious  services,  of  which  the 
forms  varied,  more  or  less,  from  these  we  have  de- 
scribed. Singing  was  an  important  part  of  their  exer- 
cises. They  sang  such  simple  hymns  as  we  have 
spoken  of,  and  Psalms  from  the  Jewish  Psalms.  The 
love-feast,  a  feast  where  none  but  Christians  came,  and 


A.  D.  202-250.]  HER    BOY    MARION.  69 

which  was  accompanied  by  religious  services,  was  one 
of  these  social  meetings. 

In  such  a  simple  life  must  this  young  Christian  girl 
have^  grown  up.  With  an  account  of  the  form  of  her 
marriage,  and  one  sad  story  of  her  life,  we  will  close 
this  chapter. 

She  was  to  marry  a  Christian.  Now,  though  a  legal 
marriage  could  be  made  without  the  presence  of  the 
priest,  this  never  was  permitted  among  Christians. 
When  Mary  was  married,  she  and  the  young  man  who 
was  to  be  her  husband  went  to  the  church  wearing 
wreaths  of  flowers,  Mary  wearing  a  veil,  and  having 
on  her  finger  the  gold  betrothal-ring  which  he  had  put 
there  the  day  of  their  public  espousal.  They  carried 
with  them  an  offering  for  the  poor ;  they  then  partook 
together  of  the  Lord's  Supper,  and  ihe  minister  asked 
a  blessing.  There  must  have  been  a  groomsman,  for 
that  is  a  very  early  custom  ;  —  the  deaconesses  were 
present  too,  with  their  other  friends.  The  bride  and 
bridegroom  joined  hands,  as  the  pastor  blessed  them  ; 
—  they  kissed  each  other,  —  and  he  pronounced  them 
one.  From  such  a  union  they  went  forth  to  a  life 
whose  close  we  know  to  have  been  more  bleak  and  sad 
than  we  have  supposed  its  opening. 

Among  their  children  was  a  boy  whom  they  named 
Marion,  in  memory  of  his  mother's  name.  He  grew 
up  devoted  to  the  faith  into  which  he  was  born  and 
baptized.  He,  too,  was  early  taught  to  read  in  the 
Scriptures,  and  so  well  did  he  read,  that  as  he  grew  up 
he  was  appointed  one  of  the  readers  in  their  church ; 
who  read  sometimes  alternately  with  their  bishop  or 


70  MARION.  [a.  d.  202-250. 

minister,  and  sometimes  alone.  A  great  pleasure  this 
to  Mary,  to  see  her  boy  growing  up  to  be  really  of  use 
in  that  service  of  God  which  she  loved.  We  do  not 
know  how  old  young  Marion  was  when  made  a  reader, 
but  boys  of  tender  age  were  sometimes  appointed  to 
that  office.  He  must  have  been  still  young  when  the 
minister,  whose  name  is  lost,  started  once  upon  a  jour- 
ney, and  took  with  him  Marion  and  one  of  the  deacons, 
whose  name  was  James.  They  stopped  one  night  at  a 
place  called  Muguas,  near  where  the  city  of  Constan- 
tine  now  stands,  in  Algeria.  Unfortunately,  it  proved 
that  the  people  and  Roman  officers  here  were  carrying 
on  a  bitter  persecution.  They  had  even  seized  on  some 
persons  who  w^ere  there  in  banishment  from  their  old 
homes,  and  had  tried  and  punished  them  for  their  Chris- 
tianity. Here  the  "  stationaries,"  as  the  governor's 
deputies  were  called,  suspecting  our  travellers  to  be 
Christians,  seized  them,  and  hurried  them  off  to  prison 
to  be  tried.  The  old  narrative  of  their  fate  is  told  with 
a  simplicity  which  seems  to  show  that,  as  it  professes, 
some  friend  wrote  it.  They  were  examined  by  torture, 
hung  by  their  thumbs  only  in  the  air,  with  heavy 
weights  fastened  to  their  feet,  and  then  thrown  into 
prison. 

Marion  slept  soundly,  says  the  simple  story,  —  and 
it  goes  on  to  tell  what  each  of  them  dreamed.  He 
dreamed  that  he  was  led  up  a  great  many  steps  upon 
the  scaffold  where  the  governor  was  to  try  them,  as  he 
supposed.  On  each  side  were  lines  of  faithful  con- 
fessors, whom  he  knew  were  to  be  beheaded.  At  last 
he  heard  them  cry,  "  Call  Marion."     "  I  mounted  the 


A.  D.  202-250.]       Marion's  dream.  71 

scaffold,"  he  said,  in  telling  his  dream  in  the  morning, 
"  and  there  was  amazed*  to  see  Cyprian  seated  on  the 
right  hand  of  the  judge."  Cyprian  was  the  Bishop  of 
Carthage,  who  had  suffered  martyrdom  a  short  time 
before.  "  Cyprian,"  continued  Marion,  "  held  out  his 
hand,  lifted  me  to  the  highest  seat,  and  said  to  me, 
smiling,  '  Come,  sit  with  me.'  Then  I  sat  with  them 
while  all  the  others  were  called  for.  Then  the  judge 
rose,  and  we  accompanied  him  to  his  judgment-hall, 
walking  through  an  agreeable  meadow,  surrounded  with 
beautiful  thick  green  trees,  among  which  were  some 
cypresses  which  rose  to  the  sky,  so  that  we  could  only 
see  the  wood  all  around  the  meadow.  In  the  middle 
of  it  was  a  very  large  fountain  of  the  purest  water. 
All  of  a  sudden  the  judge  disappeared  ;  and  Cyprian 
took  a  vase,  which  was  by  the  side  of  the  fountain,  and 
filled  it  and  gave  it  to  me.  I  drank  gladly,  and  as  I 
gave  thanks  to  God,  the  sound  of  my  voice  waked  me." 
The  story  tells  the  dreams  of  some  of  his  fellow- 
prisoners, —  but  does  not  tell  as  much  as  we  should  be 
glad  to  know  of  them  or  of  their  previous  lives.  After 
some  days'  imprisonment  they  were  brought  out  before 
one  of  the  magistrates.  A  Christian  in  the  immense 
mob  around  them  showed  so  much  interest  in  their  fate, 
that  he  was  seized  and  joined  with  them,  as  they  were 
all  dragged  before  the  governor.  The  journey  was 
long  and  tedious,  and  the  delay  afterwards,  from  the 
great  number  of  Christians  who  were  tried,  still  more 
long  and  tedious.  At  last  their  turn  came.  They  were 
sentenced,  with  all  the  others  who  held  any  office  in  the 
Church,  to  death. 


72  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  D.  273-337. 

They  were  led  out  to  die  into  a  valley  with  hills  on 
both  sides,  where  were  crowds  looking  on.  A  great 
number  of  the  Christians  were  ranged  in  order,  to  be 
beheaded.  Their  eyes  were  bandaged,  —  and  they 
said  to  those  near  them,  that  they  saw  in  vision  white 
horses  mounted  by  riders  in  white,  —  recollecting  the 
vision  in  the  book  of  Revelation.  Marion  said  aloud, 
that  vengeance  would  come  for  their  innocent  blood, 
and  that  plague,  pestilence,  and  famine  would  ravage 
the  world.  These  were  their  last  words  before  they 
were  beheaded. 

And  his  mother  Mary  was  there.  They  had  sent 
for  her  that  she  might  be  near  him.  When  she  saw 
him  dead,  she  thanked  God  that  she  had  given  birth  to 
such  a  son,  embraced  his  lifeless  body,  and  kissed  it 
again  and  again. 

And  thus  closes  the  very  little  that  we  know  of  her 
,  and  of  him. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

CONSTANTINE. 

In  the  year  273,  not  many  years  after  the  death  of 
Marion,  in  a  province  of  the  immense  Roman  Em- 
pire far  distant  from  Numidia,  there  was  born,  in  a 
village  called  Naissus,  a  child  whose  parents  called  him 
Constantine.  His  father  was  a  brave  soldier,  named 
Constantius,  of  noble  descent.  His  mother  was  the 
daughter  of  an   innkeeper.      Her  name  was  Helena. 


A.  D.  273-337.]       THE    YOUNG    SOLDIER.  73 

Neither  his  father  nor  mother  were  Christians.  They 
would  hardly  have  been  able  to  tell,  perhaps,  what  their 
religion  was.  They  did  not  carry  their  child  to  bap- 
tism therefore,  —  they  did  not  send  him  to  be  trained 
in  the  Christian  schools,  —  and  he  could  only  have  at- 
tended Christian  worship  as  those  did  who  went  to  look 
on,  but  were  not  believers.  He  did  not  care  much  for 
books  or  study,  and  in  his  boyhood  had  not  many  op- 
portunities for  learning.  For  his  father  and  mother 
went  to  different  regions  as  the  army  moved,  and,  very 
naturally,  the  son  of  a  soldier  grew  up  with  more  love 
of  adventure  and  battle  than  of  books. 

He  was  a  finely  formed  young  man,  and  well  trained 
in  the  exercises  of  the  camp.  When  he  was  old  enough 
he  became  a  soldier  himself.  He  rose  in  rank  very 
fast,  for  this  was  about  the  time  when  his  father  was 
promoted  to  the  dignity  of  "  CcBsar,''''  which  made  him 
only  next  to  the  two  Emperors.  The  young  man  was 
pleasant  in  his  bearing,  —  tall  and  of  fine  figure,  — 
always  temperate  in  the  pursuit  of  pleasures,  and  so 
successful  a  soldier  that  he  was  a  favorite  with  his  fel- 
low-soldiers and  the  people. 

He  did  not  serve  in  the  armies  which  his  father  com- 
manded. They  were  in  Gaul,  the  region  we  know  as 
France.  The  jealousy  of  the  Emperor  Diocletian, 
who  was  unwilling,  perhaps,  that  such  a  father  and  such 
a  son  should  be  near  each  other,  —  and  of  Galerius, 
who  was  also  a  "  Ccesar^''''  —  kept  him  quite  in  the  east 
of  the  Empire,  while  his  father  was  quite  in  the  west. 
There  he  fought  in  wars  in  Egypt,  and  against  the 
Parthians.     He  was  a  prince  of  such  promise,  that  Ga- 

NO.    VIII.  7 


74  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  D.  273-337. 

lerius  dreaded  his  joining  his  father,  and  exposed  him 
to  different  dangers,  in  the  hope  that  he  might  lose  his 
life.  He  sent  him  once  into  a  conflict  with  a  lion, 
where  Constantino  got  the  better  of  his  savage  adver- 
sary. Another  such  cowardly  attempt  gave  him  the 
opportunity  in  which  he  joined  his  father.  He  was  in 
a  battle  in  Parthia,  and  having  overcome  one  of  the 
enemy''s  heroes  he  dragged  him,  as  he  rode,  by  the 
very  hair  of  his  head,  to  Galerius  to  beg  for  life.  The 
Ccesar  replied  by  bidding  him  make  a  difficult  charge 
through  a  morass  on  the  enemy.  This  the  young  sol- 
dier did,  opened  a  way  for  the  Roman  troops,  and  came 
back  victorious.  Galerius  affected  to  rejoice  at  his  vic- 
tpry.  He  told  him  to  prepare  to  go  the  next  morning 
to  his  father  in  Gaul,  who  was  sick  and  had  sent  for 
him.  Constantine  knew  that  he  meant  to  give  orders 
to  have  him  arrested  on  the  way,  and  therefore  set  out 
instantly.  Galerius,  as  soon  as  he  waked  the  next 
morning,  did  give  the  orders  for  the  arrest,  but  his 
young  rival  was  quite  beyond  his  power.  He  travelled 
with  the  government  post-horses  as  quickly  as  possible 
across  Europe,  and  overtook  his  father  just  as  he  was 
crossing  into  Britain.  His  father  had  been  lately  pro- 
claimed "  Augustus,"  a  higher  rank  than  that  of  "  Cae- 
sar." 

In  this  island,  now  so  well  known  to  the  world,  they 
achieved  a  victory  over  some  insurgent  Caledonians. 
And  there  Constantius  died,  and  his  son  Constantine 
was  proclaimed  his  successor  by  the  soldiers.  So  that 
he  became,  when  thirty-two  years  old,  the  "  Augus- 
tus "  or  Emperor  of  the  West. 


A.  D.  273-337.]     THE    CHURCH    PILLAGED.  75 

This  was  in  the  year  308.  Now  at  this  very  time 
the  Christians,  in  ahnost  all  parts  of  the  world,  were 
suffering  under  the  most  wide-spread  and  terrible  per- 
secution they  had  ever  known.  It  began  in  Nicomedia, 
a  city  where  the  Emperor  now  lived,  for  they  had  de- 
serted Rome.  Nicomedia  was  in  Bithynia,  of  whose 
eager  Christianity  we  have  already  seen  something.* 
It  was  the  city  which  Pliny  tried  to  save  from  fire  when 
he  was  governor  of  that  province.  In  this  city  the 
Christians  had  a  beautiful  and  costly  church.  It  stood 
on  a  high  hill,  overlooking  most  of  the  town  and  the 
Emperor's  palace.  To  their  dismay,  one  morning,  by 
the  Emperor's  own  command,  it  was  entered  by  the 
officers  of  the  court.  The  pagans,  to  their  astonish- 
ment, found  no  statue  there  of  the  Deity  worshipped. 
But  they  seized  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  burned  them, 
and  the  soldiers  plundered  whatever  they  could  find  in 
the  building.  They  wanted  to  burn  it,  but  the  Emperor 
was  afraid  lest  the  flames  should  spread  to  the  palace, 
and  commanded  that  it  should  be  pulled  down  ;  and 
the  poor  Christians  saw  in  a  few  hours  their  church  de- 
stroyed. Thus  publicly  did  the  Emperor  and  his  "  Cse- 
sar  "  Galerius  show  that  they  had  begun  in  earnest  a 
new  career  against  the  Christians.  The  next  day  an 
edict  against  them  was  published.  It  was  the  most 
severe  ever  issued  against  them.  All  their  churches 
were  to  be  destroyed,  and  their  Scriptures  were  to  be 
burned.  They  were  degraded  from  all  office  and  rank, 
and   no  assemblies  for  worship  were  to  be  permitted. 

*  In  Chapter  III. 


76  CONSTANTINE.  [a.d.  273-337 

Only  a  few  weeks  after,  the  Emperor's  splendid  pal- 
ace in  Nicomedia  was  destroyed  by  fire.  It  is  a  little 
curious  that  that  old  want  of  a  fire  department,  or  of  the 
hook  and  ladder  company  which  Pliny  asked  for,  should 
last  so  long,  and  have  such  fatal  consequences.  The 
fire  was  at  once  charged  on  the  Christians.  The  per- 
secution was  all  the  more  bitterly  carried  out  in  conse- 
quence. In  almost  all  other  parts  of  the  Empire  it  was 
enforced  with  care,  so  that  it  became  the  most  general 
persecution  ever  known.  It  began  while  Constantius 
still  lived.  He  only,  of  the  Roman  princes,  delayed  its 
execution,  as  far  as  he  could,  in  the  provinces  under  his 
direction.  The  effort  to  destroy  the  Christian  books 
was  the  most  cunningly  devised  of  all.  But  it  proved 
inefTectual,  though  great  numbers  of  books  which  we 
now  long  for  were  destroyed  in  obedience  to  it.  So 
numerous  were  the  Christians  now,  however,  and  in  so 
many  places  of  trust,  that  this  no  longer  seemed  the 
persecution  of  a  few  slaves  or  insignificant  people,  —  a 
movement  of  no  consequence  to  persons  of  influence. 
It  was  a  real  civil  war  in  the  very  heart  of  every  city 
and  country  in  the  civilized  world. 

There  were  Christians  enough  in  the  army,  to  have 
become  there  a  very  serious  matter.  It  made  the  troops 
in  some  quarters  very  loth  to  serve  such  Emperors. 
And  the  unwillingness  with  which  Constantius  carried  it 
out  in  Gaul  endeared  him  in  the  same  proportion  to  the 
troops  under  him. 

The  Christian  Church  did  not  in  the  least  dimmish 
under  these  distressing  sufferings.  Persecution  has 
never  weakened  it.     And  at  this  time  there  can  be  no 


A.  D.  273-337.]       GALERIUS    HUMILIATED.  77 

doubt  that  so  much  luxury  had  come  into  it,  and  so 
many  contentions,  and  so  much  pride  and  personal  am- 
bition, in  consequence  of  luxury,  that  such  a  discipline 
greatly  improved  it  in  morals  and  dignity. 

Such  was  the  state  of  affairs  in  the  Church  and  in 
the  Empire,  when  Constantino  became  Emperor,  or 
"  Augustus,"  with  the  rule  of  all  those  parts  of  Europe 
which  we  know  as  Great  Britain,  France,  Holland,  Bel- 
gium, Switzerland,  Spain,  and  Portugal.  He  showed 
no  desire  for  the  extension  of  his  empire.  A  dissolute 
prince,  named  Maxentius,  ruled  Italy  and  Africa.  Max- 
imin  ruled  Egypt  and  Syria,  and  the  Emperor  Galerius 
was  the  lord  of  the  rest  of  the  Roman  world.  All  these, 
except  Constantino,  kept  up  the  severity  of  the  new  de- 
cree against  the  Christians  for  eight  long  years.  But 
in  311  the  cruel  Galerius  fell  sick  of  a  disgusting  and 
terrible  disorder.  He  got  no  relief.  He  found  he  must 
die.  And  then,  in  the  agonies  of  his  disease,  reviewing 
his  cruelties,  he  hoped  to  conciliate  the  God  of  the 
Christians,  whom  he  so  feared  he  might  meet  in  judg- 
ment, by  withdrawing  at  the  last  the  fatal  instrument 
under  which  they  had  so  suffered.  From  his  death-bed 
he  issued  an  edict,  which  apologized  for  the  past  sever- 
ities against  the  Christians,  permitted  the  free  exercise 
of  the  Christian  religion,  —  on  the  ground  that  it  was 
better  than  none.  "  Let  them  be  Christians  as  before," 
says  the  humiliated  Emperor,  conquered  by  the  long  en- 
durance of  his  enemies  ;  and  he  ended  with  these  touch- 
ing words  :  "  In  using  the  grace  which  we  bestow,  they 
will  be  obliged  to  pray  God  for  our  health,  for  the  state, 
and  for  themselves."  A  letter  a  few  days  after,  provid- 
7* 


78  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  D.  273- 337. 

ing  for  the  execution  of  this  edict,  says,  that  "  the  Em- 
perors make  this  grant,  impelled  by  their  natural  good- 
ness and  piety,  since  it  has  been  proved  now,  by  long 
experience,  that  there  is  no  means  of  persuading  the 
Christians,  or  curing  them  from  their  obstinacy." 

Such  a  triumph  had  the  Church  after  its  hardest  trial. 
So  true  did  it  prove  that  they  who  endured  to  the  end 
should  be  saved.  There  had  been  no  insurrection,  m 
this  long  persecution  ;  no  effort  to  meet  force  with  force. 
There  had  been  willing  martyrdom,  there  had  been 
flight,  so  that  the  kingdom  of  Armenia,  east  of  the  Ro- 
man Empire,  was  made  Christian  by  the  emigration,  and 
gained  the  glory  of  being  the  first  Christian  kingdom  in 
the  world.  There  had  been  crowded  prisons;  there  had 
been  untold  suffering  in  private  ;  but  no  battles,  no  sedi- 
tions, —  and  here  was  the  victory  !  Everywhere  where 
the  edict  was  proclaimed,  the  prisons  were  thrown  open, 
and  the  laborers  sentenced  to  the  mines  returned  to 
their  homes.  Everywhere,  in  long  processions,  the 
Christians  hastened  to  visit  the  loved  spots  where  their 
churches  had  been  destroyed.  The  number  of  confes- 
sors, who  had  been  compelled  to  keep  secret,  amazed 
tlieir  enemies  ;  and  the  novelty  of  toleration  called  forth 
from  the  Church  more  demonstrations  o^  its  faith  than 
ever. 

The  dissolute  Maxentius  was,  meanwhile,  losing  all 
his  popularity  in  Rome.  He  had  been  another  Nero 
there  in  his  lust  and  tyranny.  He  was  the  only  gov- 
ernor of  the  Roman  world  who  had  dared  resist  the  edict 
of  toleration.  The  Popes  say  that  he  condemned  Mar- 
cellus,  the  Bishop  of  Rome  in  his  time,  to  sweep  his  sta- 


A.  D.  273-337.]         THE  SIGN  IN  THE  SKY.  79 

ble,  as  his  groom.  But  it  mattered  little  which  side  he 
took  between  the  Christians  and  the  heathen.  Constan- 
tine  had  been  called  into  Italy  from  Gaul,  by  the  op- 
pressed people.  Constantino,  for  the  first  time  since  he 
was  Emperor,  left  his  own  province,  crossed  the  Alps, 
and  marched  down  into  Italy.  Maxentius  affected  not 
to  fear  him.  One  of  his  generals  was  to  oppose  him 
near  Verona.  And  Maxentius  consulted  the  books  of 
the  Sibyls  to  know  the  result.  The  answer  was,  "  The 
enemy  of  the  Romans  shall  conquer " ;  an  answer 
which  told  but  little,  as  each  army  was  a  Roman  army 
His  general  was  beaten.  Maxentius  marched  out  with 
his  own  army  from  Rome,  and  posted  them  on  the  other 
side  of  the  river  Tiber.  Constantino,  with  his  faithful 
troops,  rejoiced  to  see  them  there,  for  he  had  dreaded 
the  necessity  of  a  siege.  He  was  completely  success- 
ful in  the  battle  which  followed.  Maxentius's  troops 
were  routed,  and  he  was  killed.  Constantino  entered 
Rome  in  triumph,  and  added  the  dominions  of  Maxen- 
tius to  his  own. 

A  long  time  after  this  victory  of  Constantino's,  there 
was  told  this  story  of  it,  which  was  not,  however,  invent- 
ed till  long  after.  It  is  said  that  Constantino,  doubting 
which  of  the  different  faiths  in  the  world  he  should 
choose,  prayed  God  to  guide  him.  And  suddenly,  "  As 
he  marched  with  his  army,  just  after  noon,  the  sun  be- 
ginning to  go  down,  the  sign  of  a  cross  in  light  ap- 
peared in  the  sky,  above  the  sun,  with  the  inscription 
'  Conquer  by  this.'  He  and  all  the  soldiers  who  were 
with  him  in  that  march  saw  this,  and  were  greatly 
amazed."     He  did  not  know,  the  story  says,  what  this 


80  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  d.  273  -  337. 

meant.  Night  came  on.  "  Then  the  Christ  of  God 
appeared  to  him  with  that  sign  which  was  shown  to  him 
in  the  sky,  and  ordered  him  to  make  a  mihtary  stand- 
ard hke  that  which  he  had  seen  in  the  heavens,  and  to 
use  it  as  a  safe  talisman  in  his  battles." 

The  story  thus  told  is  an  invention.  It  would  have 
been  the  first  time  and  the  last  that  Jesus  offered  him- 
self to  lead  battles,  were  it  true.  He  seeks,  as  has  been 
said  of  this  matter,  to  make  us  unwarlike,  and  not  to 
give  us  war-cries.  But  it  is  true  that  Constantino  made 
such  a  banner,  and  this  was  long  preserved  as  the  sa- 
cred banner  of  the  Empire.  It  was  a  cross  with  the 
letters  of  the  name  of  Christ  curiously  united  on  the  top 
of  it,  and  a  purple  banner  fastened  to  it.  It  was  called  the 
Laharum^  and  often  led  the  Emperors'  troops  to  victory. 
Nor  can  we  doubt  that  Constantino,  as  he  saw  more  and 
more  of  Christian  constancy,  and  knew  more  and  more 
of  the  Redeemer,  was  almost  persuaded  to  be  a  Chris- 
tian, as  many  men  in  circumstances  like  his  have  been. 
That  is,  his  reason  was  satisfied  that  the  cross  was  the 
only  sign  by  which  one  could  really  conquer ;  but  his 
own  selfishness  was  not  subdued,  nor  his  heart  touched, 
so  that  he  should  really  conquer  by  it ;  —  conquer  him- 
self first,  and  so  all  obstacles  before  him. 

As  different  writers  tell  the  story,  different  places 
are  assigned  for  the  vision.  It  was  probably  before  he 
entered  Rome  that  he  made  and  first  used  the  Labarum. 
After  his  conquest  of  Maxentius  he  joined  Licinius,  then 
Csesar  in  the  East,  and  they  two  together  issued  an  edict 
of  complete  toleration  to  all  Christians  everywhere. 
They  even  recalled  the  little  clauses  which  had  been  left 


ii.  D.273-337.]  SUNDAY.  81 

in  Galerius's  decrees,  which  required  the  Christians 
"not  to  offend  law";  —  vague  clauses,  which  might 
have  been  made  dangerous  to  them.  Constantine  did  not 
profess  Christianity.  But  he  gave  this  entire  tolerance 
to  all  religionists.  He  had  always  been,  as  far  as  he 
had  any  religion,  a  heathen,  reverencing  Apollo  par- 
ticularly as  the  messenger  from  the  Most  High.  Hea- 
thenism had  its  fashions,  and  this  worship  of  Apollo  was 
its  fashion  just  then.  It  probably  had  an  Egyptian  ori- 
gin. For  the  Egyptians  recognized  the  sun  as  the  em- 
blem of  their  Amoun,  the  first  representative  of  the  Su- 
preme. The  Christian  bishops  of  the  day,  eager  to  con- 
vert Constantine,  used  to  try  to  show  him  that  his  Apol- 
lo was  in  fact  their  Christ.  The  young  soldier,  who  be- 
gan life  generous,  but  prudent,  had  grown  more  cunning 
as  he  grew  older.  He  played  with  the  bishops  ;  he  used 
to  converse  with  them,  go  to  church  with  them,  talk 
Christianity  with  them,  and  all  the  time  he  was  measur- 
ing the  weight  of  the  Christian  influence  in  the  state. 
He  found  it  was  very  strong.  The  Christians  were  a 
minority  probably.  But  they  were  a  united  minority. 
And  a  united  minority  always  prevails  against  a  divided 
majority.  Constantine  was  satisfied  that  they  were  the 
powerful  party.  He  did  not  submit  himself  to  the  Gos- 
pel, but  he  gradually  gave  to  the  state  the  Christian 
name.  The  bishops,  alas  !  over-estimated  the  worth  of 
his  alliance.  They  bent  to  meet  him.  As  j^ears  passed 
on,  more  and  more  favorable  edicts  and  state  arrano^e- 
ments  befriended  the  Christians,  and  called  them  into 
places  of  power.  One  very  singular  one  made  Sun-da.y 
observed  through  the  Empire,  as  a  day  when  no  public 


82  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  d.  273  -  337. 


duties  were  to  be  done.  But  no  Christian  character  was 
given  to  the  decree.  It  was  as  Sim  day,  and  not  as  the 
resurrection  day,  that  it  was  thus  honored.  So  eagerly 
did  the  cunning  Emperor  win  two  parties  at  once  ;  the 
Christians  by  the  gift,  —  the  heathen  by  its  name.  A 
decisive  victory  made  Constantine  sole  Emperor ;  and 
now,  twelve  years  after  his  first  edict  of  toleration,  he 
felt  strong  enough  to  proclaim  Christianity  the  religion 
of  the  Empire.  And  he  sits  now,  president  of  Christian 
councils,  called  to  settle  the  dissensions  of  Christian 
churches.  He  builds  Constantinople.  He  ornaments 
it,  not  with  pagan  temples,  but  with  beautiful  Christian 
churches. 

But  so  little  of  the  Redeemer's  spirit  was  in  this  great 
prince,  that  in  the  midst  of  such  professions  he  killed 
his  son,  a  fine  young  man,  of  great  service  to  the  state 
and  to  his  father,  because  jealous  of  his  popularity.  He 
killed  then,  in  some  wild  impulse,  his  own  wife  Fausta, 
the  mother  of  his  surviving  children.  Bloody  battles 
were  at  an  end  for  him,  for  he  was  ruler  of  the  world. 
But  the  Christians,  no  longer  persecuted,  were  wrangling 
with  each  other.  Every  sort  of  dissension  was  among 
them,  and  the  Emperor  found  himself  called  upon  as 
eagerly  as  even  when  he  was  charging  the  Parthians 
when  a  boy.  He  was  better  fitted  for  that  duty  than 
for  this.  The  question  whether  Jesus  were  the  Infinite 
God  was  up  now  for  the  first  time  as  a  matter  of  con- 
test. The  older  Christians  had  never  stated  their  opin- 
ion with  a  controversial  zeal  upon  it.  Now  it  divided 
the  Church  to  its  centre.  And  the  Church  was  so  won 
by  the  mockery  of  being  called  the  "state  religion,  that 


A.  D.  273  -  337.]       A  CHRISTIAN  EMPEROR  !  83 

Christian  men,  ministers  even,  bishops  even,  were  will- 
ing to  call  in  a  cunning  statesman  like  Constantino,  his 
hands  reeking  with  the  blood  of  his  own  household,  his 
heart  haunted  by  remorse,  to  be  the  arbiter  of  such  a 
question  !  While  they  so  threw  away  self-respect,  wc 
must  be  grateful  that  Constantino  himself  saved  the 
Church  from  the  disgrace  of  owning  him  as  a  Christian. 
He  would  not  all  this  time  consent  to  be  baptized.  On 
this  great  question  he  was  now  on  one  side,  now  on  the 
other,  as  the  balance  of  parties  might  turn.  Now  one 
was  up,  and  now  the  other,  and  the  Emperor's  smile, 
which  guided  the  changes  in  part,  was  guided  by  them 
all  the  while.  This  great  controversy  lasted  for  centu- 
ries. Arius  was  the  leader  of  those  who  thought  Jesus 
was  not  God.  Athanasius  led  those  who  maintained 
that  God  the  Father,  God  the  Son,  and  God  the  Holy 
Spirit  were  three  persons,  but  one  God.  From  their 
names,  this  is  called  the  Arian  and  Athanasian  contro- 
versy. 

And  at  last  Constantino  found  that  he  must  die. 
Then  first  he  sent  to  the  bishops  and  bade  them  baptize 
him.  He  put  off  the  imperial  purple,  to  put  on  the 
white  robe  of  the  baptized,  and  never  wore  the  purple 
again.     In  that  white  dress,  a  few  hours  after,  he  died. 

Constantino  is  generally  called  the  first  Christian 
Emperor.  Little  hope  for  Emperors  would  there  be, 
if  none  of  them  were  more  Christian  than  he.  Under 
his  reign  it  is  generally  said  that  the  Christian  religion 
triumphed  over  the  pagan  system.  But  such  a  triumph  ! 
The  Church  lost  all  the  surety  it  had  had  of  sincerity  in 
its  converts.     It  gained  immense  accessions,  because 


84  CONSTANTINE.  [a.  D.  273  -  337. 

now  it  was  worth  while  for  selfish  men  to  join  it,  as 
eagerly  as  they  had  shunned  it  before.  Its  humble  of- 
fices had  been  posts  of  honor,  because  posts  of  danger ; 
now  they  were  posts  of  honor  because  they  had  patron- 
age and  wealth  to  dispense.  From  that  time  to  our 
time,  the  Christian  Church  has  been  tangled  up  with 
webs  of  state  policy  and  intrigue.  Men  of  personal 
ambition  have  sought  its  offices  as  they  might  seek  those 
in  an  army.  Cardinals  and  bishops  have  shown  the 
same  spirit  as  senators  or  generals  in  their  quest  for 
power.  The  victory  which  led  to  such  results  cannot 
be  compared  with  that  victory  of  patient  endurance 
which  won  from  the  dying  Galerius  the  edict  of  tolera- 
tion, and  gave  the  persecuted  believers  an  even  right 
with  all  other  worshippers,  or  with  all  who  worshipped 
not,  before  the  law.  That  fair  field  is  the  field  where  the 
Church  is  most  sure  of  her  triumphs.  For  in  that  her 
children  are  least  selfish ;  and  her  enemies  are  left  to 
contend,  unassisted,  against  the  arm  of  Eternal  Truth, 
which  is  invincible,  if  we  leave  it  to  itself,  unfettered 
when  it  seems  unaided. 


A.  D.  331-363.] 


CHAPTER    VII. 

JULIAN. 

Six  years  before  the  death  of  Constaiitine,  his  nephew 
Julian  was  born.  This  is  the  prince  who  is  generally 
known  as  Julian  the  Apostate.  His  history  is  interest- 
ing, because  it  was  well  told  by  all  parties  who  sur- 
rounded  him.  It  has  not,  indeed,  the  real  importance, 
in  the  history  of  Christianity,  which  has  sometimes  been 
ascribed  to  it.  But  still,  a  sketch  of  his  short  life  will 
answer  our  purpose  here,  by  showing  the  real  position 
and  the  real  strength  of  the  Christian  Church  and  its 
enemies  in  Constantino's  days  and  his  successors'. 

Julian's  earliest  memories,  almost,  were  of  cruelty 
and  danger.  He  was  but  six  years  old  when  the  Em- 
peror Constantino  died,  and  the  new  Emperor,  Constan- 
tius,  then  showed  his  fear  of  other  heirs  to  the  throne, 
by  putting  to  death  at  once  almost  all  his  relatives. 
Among  those  who  thus  suffered  were  .Julian's  father 
and  his  elder  brother.  Of  course  he  could  not  have 
formed  a  very  high  idea  of  the  Christianity  of  the  prince 
who  could  be  guilty  of  such  a  crime.  The  little  boy 
had  but  one  brother  left,  Gallus,  who  was  of  feeble  body  ; 
and  they  two  were  spared  only  on  account  of  their 
weakness.  Since  his  birth  he  had  been  separated  from 
his  mother,  and  now  was  sent  with  his  brother  to  a  re- 
tired province,  where  they  were  brought  up  in  the  most 
entire  seclusion.  His  education  was  intrusted  to  the 
oversight  of  the  Bishop  Eusebius  ;  but  although  the  boy 

NO.  VIII.  8 


JULIAN.  [a.  D.  331-303. 


was  food  of  learning,  he  liad  no  great  respect  or  regard 
for  the  bishop.  He  did  turn  with  real  aflection  to  a 
faithful  slave,  Mardonius,  who  had  always  been  with 
him,  and  taken  care  of  him. 

Mardonius,  like  many  of  the  slaves  of  those  times, 
was  a  thoroughly  educated  scholar,  —  learned  m  the 
ancient  literature  of  Greece.  He  became  therefore 
really  Julian's  tutor,  directed  his  studies,  and  was  de- 
lighted to  guide  him  in  the  old  mythology,  as  he  read 
with  delight  the  poems  of  Homer,  always  delightful. 
But  Mardonius,  whether  he  owned  it  or  not,  was  no 
Christian.  As  the  young  Julian  read  of  gods  and 
goddesses  on  Olympus,  or  fighting  on  the  plains  of 
Troy,  and  of  their  descendants,  the  heroes  of  Homer's 
poems,  ]\Iardonius  took  pains  to  explain  to  him  his  no- 
tion of  these  things  ;  to  give  him  as  clear  an  idea  as 
possible  of  the  old  mythology,  and  to  make  him  love 
the  old  gods,  whom  his  uncle  Constantino  had  deserted. 
Julian,  meanwhile,  was  instructed  by  his  Christian 
teachers  in  the  history  of  the  Christian  faith.  But  their 
own  faith  was  not  high  or  ardent.  They  loved  their 
religion  because  it  was  the  religion  of  the  Emperor,  — ■ 
and  they  did  not  examine  very  closely  the  sincerity  of 
Julian  or  of  his  brother.  Nor,  indeed,  is  it  probable 
that,  as  a  boy,  .Julian  questioned  his  own  faith  very 
severely.  Sometimes  he  had  dreams,  which  he  has 
related,  which  he  thought  visions  from  the  gods.  But 
none  the  less  was  he  eager  to  learn  ;  —  a  bright,  ready 
boy,  who  had  not  yet  come  to  the  age  of  careful  in- 
quiry or  criticism.  He  learned  from  Mardonius  of  the 
rireek  gods,  therefore,  and  from  his  other  teachers  of 


A.  D.  331-3(33.]      A    READER    IN    CHURCH.  87 

Jesus  and  of  the  Bible.  And  while  believing  still  in 
these  visions,  none  the  less  was  he  willing  to  be  bap- 
tized as  a  Christian.  And  before  he  was  twenty,  he 
was  so  carefully  educated  as  one,  that  he  became  a 
public  reader  of  the  Bible  in  the  church  of  Nicomedia. 
He  is  another  instance  of  those  who,  so  young  in  life, 
have  had  the  most  important  influence  in  history. 

By  this  time  a  habit  of  concealment  and  double  deal- 
ing began  with  him.  Because  Christianity,  or  what  was 
called  so,  was  the  religion  of  the  court,  paganism  and 
polytheism  were,  of  course,  studied  somewhat  by  stealth, 
though  scarcely  prosecuted  openly.  Julian's  interest 
in  Homer  and  Homer's  heroes,  and  a  love  he  had  for 
show  and  curious  studies,  became  well  known  to  the 
teachers  and  professors  of  the  old  religions.  Poor  Ju- 
lian, meanwhile,  had  no  great  reason  to  love  Christianity 
for  its  fruits.  For  the  Christian  Emperor,  as  Constan- 
tius  chose  to  call  himself,  was  always  jealous  of  him, 
sending  him  back  and  forth  from  one  province  to  an- 
other;  sometimes  keeping  him  at  court  to  have  him 
under  his, own  eye,  —  and  then  sending  him  away,  be- 
cause afraid  of  his  popularity  there.  It  was  in  this 
way  that  he  was  sent  to  Nicomedia,  where  they  made 
him,  as  we  have  said,  a  reader  in  the  church  ;  too 
proud,  perhaps,  to  have  the  Emperor's  nephew  to  serve 
the  Church,  to  stop  to  ask  questions  as  to  the  sincerity 
of  his  faith. 

Now  Nicomedia  was  a  city  where  learned  men  of  all 
Asia  Minor  met  together.  And  it  soon  happened  to  the 
young  prince,  more  eager  for  study,  as  he  was,  than 
for  any  thing  beside,  to  hear  of  the  fine-drawn  discus- 


88  JULIAN.  [a.  D.  331-363. 

sions  of  the  heathen  philosophers,  about  the  heathen 
mysteries.  One  of  these  men,  talking  to  him  one  day, 
warned  him  against  another,  Majjmus,  who  taught 
magic,  and  came  at  his  learning  by  a  royal  road.  Ju- 
lian took  the  warning  as  it  was  not  meant.  "  You 
may  stay  here  with  your  books,"  he  said,  "  that  is  the 
very  man  I  want."  And  he  went  at  once  to  Maximus, 
an  ingenious,  learned  man,  who  acquired  at  once  a  great 
influence  over  him. 

For  Julian  was  quick,  —  a  hard  student,  imagina- 
tive, easily  ex-cited,  conceited,  and.  energetic.  He  had 
the  feeling  which  all  young  men  of  twenty  have,  if 
they  have  any  power,  and  which  it  must  be  hoped  they 
always  will  have,  —  that  he  could  mend  the  order  of 
things  as  he  saw  it  all  around  him.  The  same  feeling 
might  have  been  led  to  magnificent  results  for  Chris- 
tianity and  the  world.  It  was  seized  upon  by  the 
heathen  philosophers.  They  interested  him  in  their 
secret  societies.  They  showed  him  the  exciting  won- 
ders of  their  magic  and  worship.  So  they  won  upon 
him,  that,  while  still  in  pretence  a  Christian,  he  was 
initiated  into  their  own  secret  rites  as  one  of  themselves. 
The  form  of  heathenism  which  he  particularly  pro- 
fessed for  his  own  was,  as  Constantine's  was,  the  wor- 
ship of  the  Sun.  As  we  have  said,  it  was  the  form 
which  grew  out  of  a  favorite  statement  of  the  Egyp- 
tian priests.  Julian's  description  of  the  vision  in  which 
he  thus  selected  Apollo,  or  was  selected  by  him,  is 
this :  — 

"  He  [Julian]  fell  into  a  sleep  or  trance  ;  and  he  be- 
held The  Sun  himself,  the  invisible  god,  of  whom  the 


A.  D.  331-363.]       HE    IS    MADE    AUGUSTUS.  89 

sun  in  the  heavens  is  the  visible  symbol.  Beside  him- 
self at  this  sight,  the  young  man  spake  thus,  '  To  thee, 
O  father  of  the  gods,  I  henceforth  entirely  devote  my- 
self, in  gratitude  for  all  this  which  thou  hast  shown  me.' 
Clinging  with  his  hands  to  the  knees  of  the  Sun,  he  be- 
sought him  to  take  him  into  his  protection." 

Julian  thus  adopted  the  Sun,  as  Constantino  had,  as 
his  tutelar  god  ;  just  as  our  native  Indians  each  has  his 
"  Medicine." 

But  he  had  to  conceal  his  avowal  of  the  old  faith. 
Doubtless  the  concealment  gave  it  half  its  charm.  In 
a  year  or  two  more  he  was  ordered  to  the  army  in 
Gaul.  There  he  showed  his  real  talents,  which  were 
those  of  a  consummate  general.  He  gained  the  love 
of  the  troops.  He  chastised  the  barbarians.  He  re- 
built fortifications  and  cities.  He  set  every  thing  in  ex- 
cellent order,  though  he  had  found  all  things  in  confu- 
sion. Sometimes  he  sacrificed  fifty  oxen  to  the  gods,  — 
but  in  general  he  kept  up  the  pretence  of  Christian  wor- 
ship. He  kept  up  his  studies  all  the  time.  There  are 
accounts  which  he  wrote  of  the  Germans  whom  he  had 
to  fight,  which  are  among  our  most  curious  notices  of 
the  early  history  of  that  remarkable  people. 

In  the  midst  of  this  success  the  Emperor  sent  for 
some  of  his  chosen  troops  to  go  east  to  him,  to  fight 
against  the  Persians.  The  troops  rebelled,  refused  to 
go  ;  crowned  Julian  as  their  "  Augustus,"  and  pro- 
claimed him  so.  When  the  Emperor  heard  of  this,  he 
sent  threats  to  his  cousin,  and  bade  him  lay  down  his 
dignity.  Julian  replied  by  a  masterly  march,  —  which 
Napoleon  never  surpassed,  —  at  the  head  of  a  chosen 


90  JULIAN.  [a.  D.  331-363. 

army,  through  unknown  forests,  over  unbridged  rivers, 
to  the  Danube.  He  sailed  quickly  down  that  stream, 
defeated  the  forces  he  surprised  there,  and  was  ad- 
vancing against  Constantinople  and  the  Emperor,  when 
the  Emperor  died,  and  left  to  Julian  an  undisputed 
throne. 

As  late  as  the  feast  of  Epiphany  of  that  year,  he 
had  thought  fit  to  attend  Christian  worship  ;  but  as  soon 
as  he  became  a  rebel,  he  became  an  apostate.  He 
offered  public  sacrifices  to  Jupiter  and  the  other  gods, 
—  had  the  old  omens  consulted  in  the  old  way,  —  and, 
as  he  marched,  restored  the  ancient  worship,  to  the 
great  joy  of  all  those,  Jew  or  gentile,  who  hated  the 
Christian  name.  As  soon  as  he  arrived.  Emperor,  at 
Constantinople,  he  ordered  that  temples  should  be 
opened  for  the  gods.  In  a  proclamation  he  made  all 
religions  lawful ;  but  it  was  known  what  his  views  were, 
and  of  what  religion  those  must  be  who  wanted  the 
Emperor's  favor.  And  so  the  Christian  churches  lost 
a  vast  number  of  their  pretended  friends,  quite  as  fast 
as  they  had  gained  them. 

Julian  was  now  thirty  years  old.  From  this  time  to 
his  death  is  not  two  years.  But  he  crowded  those  two 
years  full.  He  reestablished  the  pagan  worship  every- 
where. He  exhausted  the  treasury,  and  taxed  the 
Christians,  to  rebuild  the  deserted  temples.  He  fairly 
bought  worshippers.  He  had  to  do  so,  for  it  proved, 
as  it  always  proves  in  such  cases,  that  those  who  wel- 
comed the  destruction  of  one  faith  were  not  all  so 
eager  to  assist  at  the  incoming  of  another.  The  army, 
however,  readily  acknowledged  the  renewal  of  the  old 


A.  D.  331-363.]       AroLLo's  goose.  91 


services.  For,  every  time  when  Julian's  faith  offered 
a  hundred  oxen  in  sacrifice,  the  soldiers  surrounding 
the  rites  had  the  flesh  of  these  oxen  to  feast  upon,  and 
they  patronized  a  system  which  brought  to  them  such 
feasting.  Priests  were  found  to  undertake  the  services 
thus  renewed.  And  Julian,  almost  the  only  man  in 
earnest  in  this  mummery,  exerted  himself  with  amaz- 
ing zeal  to  put  life  into  the  system  he  had  made.  But, 
alas  for  him  !  the  world  never  goes  backward.  It  was 
all  a  wretched  farce  that  they  were  enacting. 

For  instance,  when  Julian  came  to  the  splendid  tern- 
pie  of  his  patron  god,  Apollo,  near  Antioch,  —  where  he 
had  spent  large  sums  to  refit  its  old  beauties,  —  he  found, 
to  his  amazement,  no  festival,  no  troops  of  worshippers. 
He  called  the  senate  of  Antioch  together,  and  thus  de- 
scribed his  disappointment :  —  "I  had  pictured  to  myself 
the  festive  processions,  I  imagined  the  victims  and  the 
holy  choirs,  the  rows  of  youths  attuning  their  voices  in 
honor  of  the  god,  and  dressed  in  garments  of  dazzling 
whiteness.  But  when  I  entered  the  grove  I  saw  no 
burning  of  incense,  no  wafer  cakes,  no  victims.  I 
was  amazed.  I  inquired  of  the  priest,  '  What  offering 
does  the  city  bring  to-day  in  honor  of  the  annual  festi- 
val of  the  god  t  '  And  he  replied,  '  I  bring  from  my 
own  house  a  goose,  as  an  offering  to  Apollo  ;  but  the 
city  has  prepared  nothing  for  him.' "  The  rebuke 
which  he  then  delivers  to  the  men  of  Antioch  shows 
that,  in  all  their  degeneracy,  they  were  not  wholly  un- 
worthy the  place  where  the  disciples  of  Jesus  were  first 
called  Christians.  "  Every  one  of  you,"  he  says,  "  al- 
lows his  wife  to  give  ail  she  has  to  the  Galileans  (or 


92  JULIAN.  [a.  D.  :]31-363. 


Christians) ;  you  support  the  poor  among  them  by  your 
goods  ;  and  thereby  promote  the  spread  of  atheism 
among  the  people.  You  give  large  and  splendid  enter- 
tainments on  your  oion  birthdays,  and  yet  no  one  brings 
even  a  little  oil  for  the  lamps  at  Apollo's  festival,  now 
after  so  long  an  interval  revived,  nor  the  smallest  of- 
fering for  the  god." 

This  took  place  while  Julian  was  starting  on  his  great 
expedition  against  Persia.  At  the  same  time,  by  way 
of  irritating  the  Christians  to  the  utmost,  he  undertook 
the  building  of  a  great  Jewish  temple  on  Mount  Moriah 
in  Jerusalem,  which  should  eclipse  the  grandeur  of  the 
Christian  church  already  erected  on  Mount  Calvary.  He 
meant  to  restore  there  the  Jewish  nation  and  priesthood. 
Now  Jerusalem  was  already  a  centre  for  the  travels  of 
Christian  pilgrims  from  every  land.  He  could  have 
hit  on  no  better  way  to  excite  and  enrage  the  Christians. 
They  were  delighted  in  the  same  proportion,  therefore, 
when,  by  every  means,  his  workmen  were  disconcerted. 
Ammian,  the  historian,  without  carefully  examining  the 
circumstances  perhaps,  says  the  masons  were  fairly 
driven  from  their  work  by  the  balls  of  fire  which  broke 
out  from  the  hill.  These  discouragements,  the  uni- 
versal hatred  with  which  the  great  Christian  population 
of  the  city  regarded  the  work,  and  the  death  of  Julian, 
put  an  end  to  the  enterprise. 

Julian  was  killed  in  a  skirmish  in  Persia,  after  he 
had  advanced  successfully  to  a  great  distance  against 
Sapor,  the  Persian  emperor.  With  the  new  reign  of 
Jovian,  the  Christian  religion  was  again  proclaimed  as 
the  religion  of  the  court.     Meanwhile,  in  Julian's  short 


A.  D.  331-363.]     A    NEW    PERSECUTION.'  93 

rciiiii,  it  had  been  threatened  with  some  persecution,  and 
begun  to  experience  it.  True,  he  had  professed  toler- 
ation. But  he  really  hated  the  Galileans,  as  he  called 
the  Christians,  and  at  every  turn  he  showed  his  hatred. 
He  began  by  compelling  officers  of  the  Christian  Church 
to  resume  the  duties  of  petty  burdensome  offices,  from 
which  they  had  been  exempt,  while  he  banished  them 
from  honorable  office  in  the  state.  He  went  on  to  tax 
their  communities  especially.  A  mob  called  Christian 
was  always  punished.  But  if  a  mob  killed  a  bishop,  it 
escaped  Julian's  anger.  Perhaps  the  Christian  Church 
would  gladly  have  tempted  him  to  greater  violence. 
"  It  knew  that  its  enemy  was  lost  if  his  prudence  aban- 
doned him."  *  Its  members  rushed  into  excesses. 
Tliey  destroyed  temples  and  altars  in  their  indignation. 
They  considered  all  Christians  as  martyrs,  whom  his 
courts  punished  for  any  offences.  And  they  succeeded 
in  rousing  him,  if  such  was  their  intention.  Perhaps  it 
is  more  fair  to  say,  that  such  a  hatred  as  he  had  for 
their  faith  could  not  remain  inactive.  The  history  of 
the  last  months  of  his  reign  is  full  of  horrors,  assassi- 
nations, secret  murders  of  large  companies.  Nero  and 
)iocletian  seemed  to  live  again.  But  his  own  speedy 
death  saved  the  Church  from  a  long  catalogue  of  such 
listresses. 

His  short  reign  taught  this  ;  that  Constantino's  nomi- 
nal Christianity,  and  his  son  Constantius's  wicked  pre- 
cnc8  of  Christianity,  had  not  won  the  great  mass  of  the 
eople  to  a  real  faith.     They  threw  it  off  as  easily  as 
they  had  put  it  on. 

*  Jules  Simon,  Life  of  Julian. 


94  JULIAN.  [a.  II.  331-363. 

But  it  taught  this  also  :  that  there  was  no  deep-seated 
love  of  the  old  faith.  The  worship  which  Julian  re- 
established was  ridiculous.  The  old  line  of  faith  was 
broken,  and  it  could  not  be  so  patched  that  the  elec- 
tricity of  the  old  enthusiasm  should  ever  flash  along 
again. 

It  taught  this  too,  even  by  Julian's  own  lips,  —  that 
though  Christianity  was  disgraced  by  its  nominal  ad- 
herents in  the  court  of  Constantius,  and  worse  disgraced 
by  the  quarrels  of  the  followers  of  Arius  and  Athana- 
sius,  still  Christian  communities  cared  for  their  own 
poor ;  maintained  their  faith  in  the  face  of  whatever 
temptation  to  abandon  it ;  and  would  make  no  terms 
with  any  form  of  philosophy  or  idolatry  which  made  to 
them  direct  or  open  proposals  for  alliance. 

So  far  the  Church  maintained  its  integrity. 

NOTE    TO    CHAPTER    VII. 

Besides  general  works  already  named,  we  commend  young 
readers  to 

Neanders  Life  of  Julian.  Translated  by  Cox.  New  York* 
Riker  &  Co. 

Dr.  Palfrey's  Lowell  Lecture,  No.  13. 


A.  D.  354-430.]  THE    GOTHS.  '  95 

CHAPTER    VITL 

THE  GOTHS. AUGUSTINE  AND  PELAGIUS. 

In  the  different  scenes  and  characters  of  early  Chris- 
tianity at  which  we  have  thus  far  looked,  we  have  had 
no  occasion  to  leave  the  wide-spread  boundaries  of  the 
Roman  Empire.  This  is  not  because  the  Apostles  or 
other  teachers  of  Christianity  had  not  passed  those 
boundaries.  Some  of  the  Apostles  even  went  into  Ar- 
menia, Parthia,  and  India.  And  there  are  traces  to  be 
found  of  Christian  influences  at  a  very  early  day  in  those 
regions.  It  is  thought  that  there  are  traces  of  the  return 
to  Abyssinia  of  the  Christian  minister  of  Queen  Candace, 
to  whom  Philip  preached.  But  the  only  detailed  his- 
tory which  we  have  of  those  times  comes  to  us  through 
classical  or  through  Chinese  literature.  It  does  not  ap- 
pear that  any  missionaries  had  thus  early  visited  China ; 
and  in  tracing  the  history  of  Christianity,  we  are  con- 
fined, therefore,  to  the  Roman  Empire,  —  not  because 
there  were  no  Christians  beyond  its  boundaries,  but  be- 
cause we  have  no  historians  of  those  who  were. 

Advancing,  however,  a  generation  beyond  Julian,  we 
come  to  a  time  when  we  meet  one  of  the  Christian  na- 
tions which  had  been  converted  by  missionaries  who  had 
left  the  knovv^n  confines  of  Rome.  Faithful  men,  cross- 
ing the  Danube  to  the  north,  into  the  regions  now  known 
as  Eastern  Germany  and  Hungary,  had  converted  the 
Goths  to  the  Christian  faith.  It  was  not,  indeed,  such 
unselfish,  unwarlike,  submissive,  and  gentle  Christianity 


96  THE  GOTHS.  [a.  D.  354-430. 

as  that  of  the  first  centuries.  But  the  Goths  were  a 
simple  people,  not  given  to  metaphysics  or  to  the  learn- 
ing of  books,  and  their  Christianity,  from  this  cause  and 
from  the  earnestness  of  those  who  instilled  it  into  them, 
was  of  a  simpler  and  more  binding  character  than  that 
which  by  this  time  prevailed  in  the  courts  or  in  the 
camps  of  the  Roman  Empire.  That  Empire  was  grow- 
ing weaker  every  day.  Its  people  had  forgotten  how  to 
fight,  —  it  was  centuries  since  they  had  a  chance  to 
govern.  The  Emperor  of  the  West,  Honorius,  had  been 
Emperor  since  he  was  eleven  years  old.  He  was  a 
weak  prisoner  in  his  palace,  in  the  hands  of  intriguing 
courtiers.  The  most  warlike  thing  he  ever  did  was  to 
practise  with  arrows  at  timid  deer  in  his  park,  and  this 
effort  proving  too  serious,  he  was  most  fond  of  feed- 
ing chickens.  Upon  him  and  his  successors,  the  war- 
like and  simple  Goths,  under  the  lead  of  Alaric,  their 
king,  made  repeated  invasions,  with  varying  success. 
Sometimes  they  were  defeated.  Sometimes  they  were 
bought  off.  Sometimes  they  were  made  allies.  But  at 
last,  in  the  year  410,  Alaric  and  his  army  took,  and  en- 
tered, the  city  of  Rome. 

The  whole  history  of  the  events  which  led  to  this 
capture,  and  which  followed  it,  is  a  miserable  tissue  of 
conspiracies,  and  falsehoods,  and  treachery,  and  baby- 
wars.  The  whole  Western  Empire,  at  the  last  gasp 
though  it  was,  could  not  furnish  such  armies  or  such 
generals  as  one  or  two  provinces  would  have  done  in 
the  glorious  days  of  Rome.  But  this  was  no  evil  in 
itself.  The  real  misery  was  the  cause  of  this  want  of 
power.     The  Roman  Emperors,  it  is  true,  pretended, 


A.  D.  354-430.]       AUGUSTINE    AT    SCHOOL.  97 

at  this  very  time,  to  abolish  paganism.  They  made 
churches  of  the  temples.  They  put  an  end  to  sacri 
fices.  They  destroyed  old  idols  of  the  gods.  But  the 
people  were  none  the  more  Christian.  They  were  li- 
centious. They  were  cowardly.  They  were  cruel, 
and  loved  still  the  fights  of  men  with  beasts.  They 
were  lazy,  and  lived  on  rations  furnished  from  the  gov- 
ernment treasuiy.  Still  they  were  quarrelsome,  and  at 
the  choice  of  a  bishop  in  Rome,  its  streets  ran  with 
blood,  which  they  dared  not  shed  to  defend  it  against 
Alaric.  And  so,  although  this  is  marked  as  the  time  of 
the  final  prostration  of  paganism,  it  may  be  marked  also 
as  a  time  of  the  real  prostration  of  Christianity.  Only 
Christianity  knows  no  final  prostration. 

The  bishops  and  clergy  alone  seem  to  have  had  any 
power.  Emperors  had  none  ;  even  generals  had  none. 
The  people  had  forgot  that  they  ever  had  any.  The 
bishops,  or  ministers  of  the  large  towns,  were  already 
using  to  the  utmost  the  influence  of  their  position.  Their 
quarrels  with  each  other  made  a  part  of  the  general  dis- 
sension. Their  care  of  the  people  under  them  sup- 
plied in  part  the  want  of  all  other  strong  administration. 

Augustine,  for  more  than  thirty  years  bishop  of  Hip- 
po in  Numidia,  lived  through  seventy-six  years  of  this 
period  of  wretched  disgrace  and  confusion.  He"  was 
born  in  Numidia.  His  mother,  a  lovely  Christian  wom- 
an, whose  life  is  well  worth  study,  may  have  had 
some  such  early  training  as  that  of  the  Mary  of  Nu- 
midia whom  we  have  described,  who  lived  a  hundred 
years  before.  But  Augustine's  father  was  a  dissolute 
man,  —  a  pagan  till  near  his  death. 


98  AUGUSTINE.  [a.  D.  354-430. 

Still,  under  his  mother's  tender  care,  he  had  a  Chris- 
tian training.  He  went  to  school  much  as  boys  do  now. 
And  though  he  says  he  was  a  bad  boy  there,  —  and  in 
many  things  this  must  be  true,  —  still,  then  there  were 
pleasant  traits,  which  showed  what  a  mother  he  had,  and 
what  a  Father  in  heaven.  "  I  began  then,"  he  says, 
"  O  God,  to  pray  to  thee  ;  and  I  broke  the  fetters  of 
my  tongue  to  call  upon  thee,  praying,  though  small,  yet 
with  no  small  earnestness,  that  I  might  not  be  beaten  at 
school."  And  then  he  makes  a  tender  plea  for  boys, — 
as  in  his  manhood  he  writes  this  :  that  teachers  will  re- 
member, that  boys  fear  their  torments  little  less  than 
the  martyrs  fear  theirs,  nor  pray  less,  sometimes,  to  es- 
cape them.  "  Will  any  of  sound  discretion  approve  of 
my  being  beaten  as  a  boy,  because,  by  playing  at  ball, 
I  made  less  progress  in  my  studies  ?  For  he  who  beat 
me,  if  worsted  in  some  trifling  discussion  with  his  fellow- 
tutor,  was  more  bitter  and  jealous  than  I  when  beaten 
at  ball  by  a  playfellow." 

He  loved  too  much  to  go  to  the  theatre  and  the  circus, 
he  says ;  he  hated  Greek  because  it  was  taught  him  as 
a  task,  while  he  loved  Latin,  which  he  had  learned  as 
we  learn  English,  without  rule,  in  the  nursery  and  at 
home.  He  says  he  stole  from  his  parents'  cellar  and 
table,  enslaved  by  greediness,  or  that  he  might  have 
something  to  give  to  boys  who  sold  him  their  playthings, 
which  all  the  while  they  loved  no  less  than  he  did. 
And  in  play,  carried  away  by  his  eagerness  to  be  first, 
he  sought  and  took  unfair  advantages.  "  But  what," 
he  adds,  "  could  I  so  impatiently  endure,  or,  when  I 
detected  it,  upbraid  so  fiercely,  as  that  which  I  was  do- 


A.  D.  354-430.]  A    BAD   BOY.  99 

ing  to  others  ;  and  yet,  when  I  was  detected  and  up- 
braided, I  chose  rather  to  quarrel  than  to  yield."  Of 
all  these  boyish  sins  he  tells  afterwards,  saying  very 
truly,  that  just  such  sins  are  transferred  from  tutors  and 
masters,  as  boys  grow  up,  to  magistrates  and  kings  ; 
from  nuts  and  balls  and  sparrows,  to  gold  and  manors 
and  slaves,  just  as  the  schoolmaster's  ferule  gives  place 
to  severer  punishments.  They  made  him  feel  that  the 
state  of  childhood  which  Jesus  said  was  the  state  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  was  not  that  of  new-born  infancy ; 
—  and  here  was  a  mystery  to  him,  for  he  was  sure  he 
had  seen  even  a  new-born  child  turn  pale  with  anger. 

When  he  was  sixteen  years  old,  he  went  away  from 
home  to  school.  And  this  adventure,  which  happened 
there,  wanton  and  mischievous  as  it  is,  seems  like  an 
account  of  what  might  have  happened  yesterday  :  —  "I 
stole  that  of  which  I  had  enough,  and  much  better. 
Nor  cared  I  to  enjoy  what  I  stole,  but  joyed  in  the  theft 
and  sin  itself.  A  pear-tree  there  was  near  our  vine- 
yard, laden  with  fruit,  tempting  neither  for  color  nor 
taste.  To  shake  and  rob  this,  some  lewd  j^oung  fellows 
of  us  went,  late  one  night  (having,  according  to  our 
wretched  custom,  prolonged  our  sports  in  the  streets 
until  then),  and  took  huge  loads,  not  for  our  eating,  but 
to  fling  them  to  the  very  hogs,  having  only  tasted  them. 
And  this  we  did  onjy  because  we  would  do  that  which 
was  not  lawful." 

At  this  academy,  which  was  at  Madaura,  he  was 
guilty  of  worse  sins  than  pear-stealing ;  worse,  because 
they  showed  a  premature  development  of  vicious  incli- 
nation.     He   plunged   into  licentiousness,    and   almost 


100  AUGUSTINE.  [a.  d.  354-430. 

broke  his  mother's  heart  by  his  dissolute  behaviour. 
His  account  of  his  hfe  there  and  her  grief  for  it  is  an 
account  of  what  has  happened  to  a  thousand  sons  and 
a  thousand  mothers.  And  any  one  of  them,  tempted 
to  go  on  in  such  a  Hfe,  may  do  well  to  read  his  account 
of  his.  He  was  a  thoroughly  bad  boy.  He  was  reck- 
less, sensual,  and  cruel.  But  he  was  bright,  of  fine 
powers,  and  of  elegant  manner  and  person.  He  had 
been,  in  his  fondness  for  the  theatre,  particularly  inter- 
ested in  rhetoric.  And  he  left  the  school  at  Madaura, 
and  went  to  the  great  city  of  Carthage,  partly  for  the 
teachers  there,  but  chiefly,  as  it  seems,  from  the  attrac- 
tions which  so  large  a  city  offered  to  a  dissipated  boy. 
His  father  had  died.  He  lived  here  at  first  on  the 
allowances  he  received  from  his  mother.  He  haunted 
the  theatre,  and  gave  himself  more  and  more  to  a  reck- 
less life. 

At  nineteen  years  of  age,  however,  he  had  somewhat 
exhausted  the  novelty  of  such  a  career,  and  a  book  — 
the  loss  of  which  we  now  regret  —  fell  in  his  way, 
which  somewhat  weaned  him  from  it.  It  was  "  Hor- 
tensius,"  by  Cicero.  It  was  an  exhortation  to  such 
philosophy  as  Cicero  knew  of,  but  it  lifted  poor  Augus- 
tine to  a  higher  learning.  "  It  altered  my  affections," 
he  says,  "  and  turned  my  prayers  to  thyself,  O  Lord  ; 
and  made  me  have  other  purposes  and  desires."  He 
turned  to  study  the  Scriptures.  But  he  was  still  a  rhet- 
orician. Cicero's  book  had  won  him,  in  part  at  least, 
by  the  elegance  of  its  style  ;  and  the  severe  simplicity 
of  the  Gospels,  which  we  so  prize,  seemed  hard  to  him 
and  bald.     So  he  almost  pushed  them  by.     He  went  to 


A.  D.  354-430.]  MANICHEANS.  101 

the  various  teachers  of  philosophy,  and  studied  with 
them.     Especially  was  he  allured  by  the  Manicheans. 

We  must  give  some  account  of  the  Manicheans,  for 
there  are  Manicheans  in  the  world  to  this  day,  though 
none  who  take  the  name  openly.  A  hundred  years  before 
Augustine,  a  Persian  named  Mani,  studying  Christianity 
and  the  old  Persian  belief  together,  had  taught  a  doc- 
trine which  found  many  followers.  They  received  this 
name  of  Manicheans.  It  had  a  wide  variety  of  strange 
results,  but  this  was  its  simple  beginning;  —  that  all 
matter  is  evil  from  its  nature  ;  that  it  is  under  the  con- 
trol of  an  Evil  God,  who  is  constantly  at  war  with  the 
God  of  Spirit,  who  is  the  Good  God  of  the  world. 
Wherever  the  theory  is  stated,  that  because  a  thing  is 
made  of  matter  it  is  wicked,  there  is  a  bit  of  Manicheism. 
Wherever  it  is  supposed  that  our  Father  in  heaven  is 
contending  always  with  another  god,  who  is  seeking  to 
ruin  the  world  and  men,  there  is  a  bit  of  Manicheism. 

Now,  with  all  the  brilliant  gorgeousness  of  most 
Eastern  language  and  ways  of  thought,  these  theories 
were  proclaimed  and  flung  upon  the  world.  A  certain 
Faustus,  who  was  perhaps  the  first  Dr.  Faustus,  was 
the  herald  of  them  in  Carthage.  Augustine  heard  him 
with  delight.  Such  doctrines  have  always  been  favorite 
doctrines  with  dissolute  men.  For  they  say,  when 
they  believe  such  a  philosophy,  that  their  flesh  as  natu- 
rally tends  to  sin,  as  the  fire  to  the  sky,  or  the  rain  to 
the  ground.  They  excuse  themselves  from  their  sen- 
suality, on  the  ground  that  it  is  in  the  nature  of  things. 

Poor  Augustine's  mother  was  distressed  all  the  more 
when  he  called  himself  a  Manichean.  But  she  prayed 
9* 


102  AUGUSTINE.  [a.  d.  354-430. 

on  for  him.  He  was  now  a  fashionable  teacher  of 
rhetoric.  And  after  some  years  he  resolved  to  go  to 
Rome.  She  knew  it  was  the  head-quarters  of  dissipa- 
tion. It  had  been  for  centuries.  She  begged  him  not 
to  go.  But  he  deceived  her  and  went.  At  Rome  he 
was  taken  sick,  and  almost  died.  The  sickness  gave 
him  a  chance  for  thought.  A  professorship  at  Milan, 
then  the  court  of  the  Emperor,  was  offered  to  him. 
He  accepted  the  office,  and  taught  rhetoric  there  with 
success.  He  lived  there  when  the  great  Bishop  Am- 
brose withstood  the  Emperor  and  his  mother,  —  who 
hoped  to  have  one  church  open  to  themselves  and  their 
Avian  friends.  Ambrose  raised  the  mob  of  the  city 
against  the  Emperor's  guards,  and,  like  a  bishop  of 
those  times,  had  his  way.  Augustine  used  to  go  to 
hear  Ambrose  preach.  He  meant  only  to  study  his 
manner,  it  was  so  fine.  But  he  could  not  hear  the 
rhetoric  without  hearing  what  was  said.  The  earnest 
bishop's  faith  took  him  captive  in  spite  of  himself.  He 
was  brought  at  last  to  see  the  vanity  of  his  life,  —  the 
meanness  of  his  ambition,  —  how  bitterly  he  had  sinned 
against  Heaven  and  in  his  Father's  eyes.  He  was  still 
living  in  open  profligacy.  But  his  mother  was  near 
him  again,  hoping  for  him  and  praying  for  him.  Some 
old  companions  were  with  him,  moved  as  he  had  been 
moved.  All  together  they  studied  the  Gospel.  Together 
he  and  Alypius  confessed  to  each  other  the  wretched 
sinfulness  of  their  lives.  They  studied  Paul  together. 
Together  they  tried  the  renunciation  of  their  intemper- 
ate and  licentious  habits,  —  but  with  wavering  success. 
Till   one   day,  in  agony  of  conscience,   they  left  the 


A.  D.  354-430.]  IN    THE    GARDEN.  103 

house  and  walked  in  the  garden,  neither  speaking  to 
the  other.  "  That  I  might  pour  forth  wholly  a  shower 
of  tears  in  its  natural  expressions,  I  rose  from  Alypius," 
he  says.  "  Solitude  seemed  to  me  fitter  for  the  business 
of  weeping ;  so  I  retired  so  far  that  even  his  presence 
could  not  be  a  burden  to  me.  He  understood  this,  and 
remained  where  we  were  sitting,  quite  overpowered. 
1  cast  myself  down,  I  know  not  how,  under  a  certain 
fig-tree,  giving  full  vent  to  my  tears  ;  and  the  floods  of 
mine  eyes  gushed  out,  an  acceptable  sacrifice  to  thee, 

0  Lord.  And  not  indeed  in  these  words,  yet  to  this 
purpose,  spoke  I  much  unto  thee.  '  And  thou,  O  Lord, 
how  long  ?  how  long.  Lord  ?  wilt  thou  be  angry  for 
ever .''  Remember  not  our  former  iniquities,'  for  I  felt 
that  I  was  held  by  them.  I  sent  up  these  sorrowful 
words  :  '  How  long  ?  how  long  ?  to-morrow  and  to-mor- 
row ?  Why  not  now  ?  why  this  hour  is  there  not  an 
end  to  my  uncleanness  ?  ' 

"  So  was  I  speaking,  and  weeping  in  the  most  bitter 
contrition  of  my  heart,  when  lo  !  I  heard  from  a  neigh- 
boring house  a  voice,  as  of  boy  or  girl,  I  know  not, 
chanting,  and  oft  repeating,  '  Take  up  and  read  ;  take 
up  and  read.'  Instantly  my  countenance  altered  ;  I  be- 
gan to  think  most  intently  whether  children  were  wont 
in  any  kind  of  play  to  sing  such  words ;  nor  could  I 
remember  ever  to  have  heard  the  like.  So,  checking 
the  torrent  of  my  tears,  I  arose  ;  interpreting  it  to  be 
no  other  than  a  command  from  God,  to  open  the  book, 
and  read  the  first  chapter  I  should  find.     Eagerly  then 

1  returned  to  the  place  where  Alypius  was  sitting;  for 
there  had  I  laid  the  volume  of  the  Apostle  when  I  arose 


104  AUGUSTINE    AND    PELAGIUS.    [a.  D.  354-430. 

thence.  I  seized,  opened,  and  in  silence  read  tha't 
section  on  which  my  eyes  first  fell :  '  Not  in  rioting  and 
drunkenness,  not  in  chambering  and  wantonness,  not  in 
strife  and  envying ;  but  put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  and  make  not  provision  for  the  flesh  in  concu- 
piscence.' No  further  would  I  read ;  nor  needed  I : 
for  instantly,  at  the  end  of  the  sentence,  by  a  light  as 
it  were  of  serenity  infused  into  my  heart,  all  the  dark- 
ness of  doubt  vanished  away." 

From  that  moment  his  resolutions  held.  He  kept 
them.  He  gave  up  his  old  lusts.  He  studied  the  Bible, 
and  was  baptized  with  his  companions.  His  mother 
died  happy.  And  he  returned  to  Africa,  —  having 
given  up  his  duties  in  Milan.  In  Africa  he  became 
first  an  elder,  and  then  the  chief  bishop  of  the  church 
in  Hippo,  —  at  that  time  the  chief  city  in  Numidia. 
He  preached  eloquently,  and  wrote  learnedly.  He 
administered  the  church  affairs  firmly,  and  compelled 
the  people  to  obey.  And  he  died  at  last  in  his  seventy- 
seventh  year,  at  Hippo,  while  the  Goth  Genseric  was 
besieging  the  town. 

We  have  a  great  many  of  his  sermons,  his  writings, 
and  his  private  letters.  It  is  very  curious  to  see  from 
them  the  private  customs  of  the  times,  —  of  people,  of 
the  churches,  of  trade,  of  religion,  and  of  politics.  For 
these  we  have  no  room  here  ;  and  must  close  this  chap- 
ter  by  some  account  of  his  great  battle  of  books,  where^ 
for  the  time,  he  won  the  victory  over  the  British  priest, 
Pelagius. 

Pelagius  means  "of  the  sea";  and  Pelagius's  name 
untranslated  was  Morgan,  which  in  the  old  British  Ian- 


A.  D.  354-430.]      THEIR    CONTROVERSY.  105 

guage  means  the  same.  Not  many  years  after  Au-. 
gustine  became  bishop,  Morgan,  or  Pelagius,  came  to 
Rome,  and  his  preaching  attracted  interest  there.  From 
that  time,  ahTiost  till  he  died,  he  and  his  followers  were 
in  contest  with  Augustine  about  human  nature,  and  the 
ways  of  its  redemption.  Augustine  thought  of  man 
kind  what  any  being  would  have  thought  who  had  never 
seen  any  man  but  Augustine.  He  thought  that  in  child- 
hood, from  birth,  they  were  desperately  wicked.  He 
thought  they  had  no  power  to  help  themselves  from  this 
wickedness.  And  he  thought  that  God  did  not  mean 
to  give  his  favor  alike  to  each  man,  but  selected  some 
vv^hom  he  would  save  by  a  miracle,  —  as  Augustine  felt 
he  was  saved  by  the  voice  which  bade  him  take  up  and 
read. 

Pelagius  held  none  of  these  doctrines.  He  was 
charged  with  heresy  because  he  held  that  Adam's  fall 
only  affected  himself  ;  that  all  men  were  born  as 
pure  as  Adam  was  born,  and,  if  they  used  their  facul- 
ties rightly,  might  remain  so, —  for  that  God  helped 
each  man,  always,  and  from  the  beginning  of  his  life. 
Starting  from  such  opposite  grounds,  these  two  heroes 
of  the  Church  led  on  armies  of  disputants  on  either 
side.  For  once  the  people  did  not  mix  in  the  contro- 
versy, it  is  said,  although  they  did  not  understand  it. 
But  priests  and  students,  in  all  the  countries  round  the 
Mediterranean,  engaged  in  it.  At  last  they  seduced 
the  poor,  weak  Honorius  to  stop  from  his  chicken-feed- 
ing long  enough  to  pronounce  an  anathema,  the  most 
bitter  curse,  on  Pelagius  and  his  followers.  This  was 
in  420  ;  but  Pelagius  lived  till  450,  and  never  abandoned 


106  AUGUSTINE    AND    PELAGIUS.    [a.  D,  854-430. 

his  views, — which  have  remained,  indeed,  in  one  branch 
o|"  the  Church  or  another  from  that  day  to  this.  And 
the  Catholic  Church  has  long  since  embraced  the  doc- 
trine it  then  cursed. 

We  do  not  enter  here  upon  the  details  of  the  contro- 
versy. It  has  been  alluded  to  in  another  volume  of  this 
series.  We  can  only  say  here  that  the  controversj'-  has 
never  died,  and  never  will.  Men  of  different  sorts  of 
temper  and  mind  will  accept  different  views  in  this 
matter.  At  this  day  it  divides  almost  every  h6dy  of 
Christians  within  itself.  It  is  worthy  of  remark,  as 
more  than  a  curious  coincidence,  that  the  scholar  whose 
own  bitter  experience  led  him  in  this  controversy  to 
deny  man's  freedom,  and  to  bind  him  so  closely  as 
Augustine  bound  him,  is  of  Africa,  —  the  land  which 
never  knew  what  free  institutions  were,  —  in  politics, 
in  society,  or  in  religion ;  the  land  whose  hot  sun  has 
always  shone  upon  impulsive  races,  which  were  will- 
ing, in  Egypt,  in  Carthage,  in  Numidia,  or  in  Ethio- 
pia, to  be  slaves ;  — and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  scholar 
who  maintained  men's  equality  before  God,  and  the 
freedom  of  their  will,  was  from  Britain,  —  the  land 
which  from  the  beginning  has  been  impatient  of  power, 
and  was  in  the  earliest  days  called  the  land  of  rebels  ; 
the  land  whose  climate,  whose  seas,  and  whose  for- 
ests had  taught  her,  before  her  written  history  began, 
something  of  the  lesson  she  has  since  taught  the  world, 
—  of  the  worth  of  freedom,  —  freedom  to  the  separate 
man,  —  the  lesson  of  the  strength  of  the  individual 
will,  and  of  that  self-reliance  which  relies  upon  self 
because  it  knows  that  so  best  it  gains  the  alliance  of 
our  God. 


A.  D.  414-453.]       RELIGION    IN    THE    PALACE.  107 

CHAPTER    IX. 

RELIGION    IN    THE    PALACE. PULCHEKIA  AND    EUDOCIA. 

We  have  spoken  with  great  contempt  of  the  quality 
of  the  Christianity  of  the  court  after  Constantino  made 
Christianity  the  rehgion  of  the  state.  It  was  impossible 
to  do  otherwise,  in  speaking  of  such  Emperors  as  Con- 
stantino, as  Constantlus,  or  Honorius.  Before  we  leave 
the  Roman  or  Greek  Empire,  however,  it  will  be  but 
just  to  show  that  there  were  instances,  as  centuries 
passed  on,  where  the  rulers  really  felt  the  worth  of  the 
faith  which  they  professed.  In  such  cases  there  is  often 
less  of  written  history  than  in  the  lives  of  more  cruel 
sovereigns.  Written  history  grows  fastest  in  times  of 
bloodshed  and  eventful  tyranny.  Our  readers  will  find 
in  the  lives  of  the  Emperors  at  Constantinople,  before 
the  capture  of  that  city  by  the  Turks  in  1453,  some  of 
these  cheering  exceptions,  where  the  successors  of 
Constantino  proved  themselves  more  worthy  of  the 
Christian  name  than  he. 

Such  an  exception  was  the  Empress  Pulcheria,  who 
was  called  to  the  throne  at  the  early  age  of  fifteen,  a 
girl  heroine,  even  younger  than  some  of  the  boy  heroes 
of  whom  we  have  spoken  already.  She  was  the  grand- 
daughter of  the  great  Emperor  Theodosius,  and  while 
Augustine  was  ruling  his  little  city  of  Hippo,  and  writ- 
ing great  books  against  all  whom  he  thought  heretics, 
she  was  administering  the  affairs  of  the  Empire  of  the 
East  in  Constantinople.      Her  father,  Arcadius,  died 


108  PULCHERIA    AND    EUDOCIA.       [a.  D.  414-453. 

when  she  was  nine  years  old.  He  was  a  weak  prince, 
and  her  mother  was  a  beautiful  and  imperious  woman, 
who  used  her  power  as  Empress  to  persecute  many  of 
the  Christians,  among  others  the  great  preacher  St.  John 
Chrysostom.*  It  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  so  beau- 
tiful a  character  as  that  of  Pulcheria  should  have  been 
formed  in  the  child  of  the  feeble  Arcadius  and  the 
cruel  Eudoxia.  It  may  be  that  the  faults  of  the  par- 
ents were  so  striking,  as  to  impress  the  mind  of  the 
youthful  princess,  and  to  serve  her  as  a  warning  and 
an  incentive  to  a  course  of  conduct  opposite  to  theirs. 

Her  talents  were  early  found  to  be  very  remarkable, 
and  she  cultivated  them  with  such  diligence  that  she 
became  Empress  at  the  early  age  we  have  named. 
She  was  the  oldest  of  her  family,  having  two  younger 
sisters,  and  a  brother  a  year  younger  than  herself,  who 
was  in  name  the  Emperor,  though  the  affairs  of  the 
Empire  were  managed  by  his  tutor  Anthemius,  who 
was  also  prime  minister.  But  the  talents  and  wisdom 
of  Pulcheria  were  such,  that  she  was  made  the  partner 
of  her  brother  Theodosius  in  the  imperial  office  ;  and 
she  conducted  the  affairs  of  the  Empire  with  great  dis- 
cretion while  she  superintended  the  education  of  her 
brother  Theodosius.  To  this  task  she  devoted  herself 
with  the  greatest  energy  ;  she  gave  him  the  best  mas- 
ters, that  he  might  become  well  learned  in  the  various 
languages,  in  the  arts  and  sciences,  and  in  philosophy  ; 
and  in  order  that  he  might  not  become  effeminate,  she 
surrounded  him  with  young  men  of  his  own  age,  who 

*  This  name  means  St.  Jolm  the  Golden-mouthed. 


A.  D.  414-453.]       THEODOSIUS    CALIGRAPH.  109 

were  to  share  his  studies,  and  join  him  in  all  those 
nnanly  exercises  which  would  strengthen  his  body. 

But  Theodosius  the  younger  was  weak,  like  his  father 
Arcadius.  He  was  quite  willing  to  be  governed,  and 
seemed  to  have  no  jealousy  of  his  older  and  wiser  sister. 
While  Pulcheria  called  in  the  assistance  of  old  and  wise 
scholars  to  instruct  her  brother,  and  active  and  earnest 
young  men  to  improve  and  strengthen  him,  she  endeav- 
ored by  her  personal  instructions  to  set  before  him  the 
duties  of  a  r&ler  of  the  people.  Her  own  clear  and 
vigorous  mind  saw  what  a  great  power  he  had  to  do 
good  in  the  high  position  in  which  God  had  placed  him, 
and  she  saw  how  much  evil  would  arise  if  he  neglected 
to  do  his  duty. 

But  Pulcheria  found  it  very  difficult  to  awaken  in  the 
mind  of  her  effeminate  brother  the  power  and  will  to 
act  well  his  part  as  a  Roman  Emperor.  He  was  relig- 
ious after  the  fashion  of  his  time.  He  spent  his  days 
and  nights  in  prayers  and  direct  acts  of  devotion,  with- 
out feeling  that  he  would  have  best  served  God  by  using 
the  great  power  which  was  put  into  his  hands  in  the 
active  service  of  his  fellow-men,  in  doing  good  and  pre- 
venting evil.  He  spent  much  of  his  time  in  recreation. 
He  loved  painting  and  carving,  and  was  fond  of  tran- 
scribing manuscripts.  He  gained  great  reputation  for 
his  handwriting,  and  he  won  by  his  success  with  his 
pen  the  title  of  Caligraph.  This  accomplishment  is  a 
step  higher  than  that  of  Honorius,  but  it  is  not  a  title 
for  an  emperor  to  be  proud  of. 

Theodosius  escaped,  however,  falling  into  those  vices 
which  have  so  often  disgraced  the  rulers  of  his  and  of 

ro.  VIII.  10 


110  PULCHERIA  AND  EUDOCIA.       [a.  D.  414- 453. 

later  times.  He  was  very  tender-hearted,  and  used  his 
imperial  power  almost  solely  in  pardoning  criminals 
who  implored  his  mercy.  "  O  sister,"  he  would  say, 
"  it  is  easy  to  make  a  man  die,  but  God  alone  can  bring 
him  to  life." 

Pulcheria  was  very  willing  to  take  upon  herself  this 
imperial  burden  of  care  which  her  brother  so  willingly 
cast  aside.  But  she  strengthened  herself  for  it  in  the 
only  true  way.  She  was  very  devout  and  pious,  and 
considered  her  first  duty  as  due  to  her  Gdd.  In  the  en- 
thusiasm and  superstition  of  her  time,  she  made  a  vow 
that  she  would  never  marry,  but  would  devote  herself 
entirely  to  the  service  of  God  and  of  the  state  ;  and  her 
influence  over  her  younger  sisters  was  so  great,  that 
they  joined  her  in  this  vow.  To  make  it  more  solemn 
and  binding,  Pulcheria  caused  it  to  be  engraved  in  large 
letters  on  a  gold  plate,  studded  with  jewelry,  which  was 
publicly  offered  to  God  in  the  great  church  of  Constan- 
tinople. 

The  practice  of  her  religious  duties  was  to  her  a  re- 
pose and  relief  from  the  heavy  burdens  of  government, 
the  duties  of  which  she  executed  with  great  fidelity  and 
diligence.  But  when  the  affairs  of  the  state  did  not  call 
for  her  attention,  she  shared  the  pious  exercises  of  her 
sisters,  and  spent  many  hours  eveiy  day  in  the  devout 
and  attentive  study  of  the  Scriptures.  Her  holy  study 
and  meditation  were  often  carried  on  even  till  the  late 
hours  of  the  night. 

The  sisters  lived  together,  in  the  part  of  the  palace 
devoted  to  them,  with  other  young  women  whom  they 
had  selected  as  companions,  and  formed  a  sort  of  relig- 


A.  D.  414-453.]       THE    CHRISTIAN    SISTERS.  Ill 

ious  community.  They  were  very  assiduous  in  their 
public  devotions,  and  cultivated  music  carefully,  espe- 
cially sacred  music,  to  which  they  gave  much  of  their 
time.  They  were  veiy  liberal  in  their  charities,  and 
sought  out  and  assisted  such  persons  as  were  in  need. 
They  were  most  fondly  attached  to  each  other,  and  all 
worked  and  prayed  together,  their  sisterly  affection  be- 
ing sanctified  by  the  most  perfect  Christian  sympathy. 
The  only  difference  between  them  was,  that  Pulcheria 
ruled  the  state,  a  dignity  which  the  younger  sisters 
yielded  up  to  her  with  the  most  modest  humility.  She 
alone  bore  the  title  of  Augusta ;  while  they  were  called 
nobilissimse,  "  most  noble."  They  were  addressed  as 
queens,  and  although  living  in  great  simplicity,  so  ex- 
cellent were  they  in  every  respect  that  they  well  main- 
tained the  royal  dignity.  They  did  not  confine  their 
charities  to  private  objects  of  benevoknce,  Arcadia, 
the  elder  of  the  two,  erected  at  her  own  expense  the 
public  baths  at  Constantinople,  which  took  from  her  their 
name,  the  Arcadian  baths. 

Pulcheria  was  perfectly  adapted  to  use  the  power 
which  seemed  to  have  thus  fallen  upon  her,  and  which 
vv^as  willingly  yielded  up  to  her  by  her  gentle  brother. 
She  carried  on  all  state  affairs  with  great  despatch,  and 
an  activity  that  was  never  wearied.  She  was  an  excel- 
lent scholar,  and  knew  familiarly  the  Greek  and  Latin 
languages,  and  could  write  and  speak  them,  when  there 
was  occasion  for  her  doing  so  in  public,  with  perfect 
ease  and  dignity.  But,  like  all  truly  great  persons,  her 
perfect  prudence  gave  a  balance  to  her  character,  so 
that  no  one  propensity  gained  an  undue  mastery  over 


112  PULCHERIA  AND  EUDOCIA.       [a.  D.  414-453. 

the  rest ;  and  the  crowning  grace  of  her  character  was 
her  entire  and  constant  reliance  upon  the  Divine  aid. 
On  every  occasion  for  action,  she  prayed  to  Heaven  for 
assistance  ;  she  reflected  deeply,  deliberated  slowly,  and 
took  the  advice  of  the  wise  and  good  counsellors  whom 
she  had  gathered  about  her.  She  took  no  honor  to  her- 
self, but  always  acted  in  the  name  of  Theodosius,  her 
brother. 

The  fame  of  these  noble  and  pious  sisters  extended, 
as  might  be  expected,  far  and  wide.  About  the  time 
when  the  Emperor  Theodosius  had  reached  the  age  of 
twenty,  there  died  at  Athens  a  lear/ied  man  by  the  name 
of  Leontius.  He  had  two  sons,  named  Neocles  and 
Eumidas,  and  one  daughter,  Athenais.  The  sons  were 
not  marked  by  any  superiority  of  talent  or  acquisition 
of  learning,  but  the  daughter  was  the  pride  of  her  father, 
and  well  repaid  by  her  diligence  and  the  aptness  of  her 
intellect  qU  the  care  the  old  Leontius  had  bestowed 
upon  her  education.  She  particularly  excelled  in  math- 
ematics, and  the  other  more  severe  studies,  so  that  her 
father,  and  all  who  knew  her,  looked  upon  her  with  the 
greatest  admiration.  For  not  only  did  she  exhibit  a  re- 
markable intellectual  superiority,  but  she  was  very 
lovely  in  her  person,  graceful  in  her  manners,  and  alto- 
gether devoted  to  her  father.  The  fame  of  the  young 
Athenian  spread  through  all  the  cities  where  the  sci- 
ences and  arts  were  cultivated  ;  and  people  came  from 
Rome,  Alexandria,  and  Antioch,  to  listen  to  her.  She 
sometimes  appeared  in  the  galleries  of  the  Academy, 
made  illustrious  by  the  lessons  of  Plato  and  the  other 
philosophers,  and  when  she  did  so,  her  words  were  lis- 


A.  D.  414-453.]       ATHENAIS    DESEKTED.  113 

tened  to  with  the  greatest  attention.  One  day,  when 
some  Egyptians  who  had  come  to  Athens  to  admire 
her  presented  her  a  crown  of  hyacinths  and  laurels, 
she  took  the  flowers  and  shared  them  with  her  compan- 
ions, and  refused  more  than  her  portion  of  them.  On 
another  occasion,  when  some  of  her  fellow-country- 
women presented  her  a  crown  of  the  most  beautiful 
flowers,  she  pretended  to  think  they  intended  them  for 
an  offering  to  the  goddess  Minerva,  and  went  to  lay  her 
crown  at  the  foot  of  the  statue  of  that  goddess. 

When  she  was  thus  at  the  height  of  her  glory,  the 
young  Athenais  lost  her  father.  Her  unkind  brothers 
pe-suaded  him,  before  his  death,  to  leave  all  his  wealth 
to  them  ;  they  told  him  that  Athenais  did  not  need  the 
gifts  of  fortune,  her  talents  were  more  to  her  than  any 
wealth  could  be.  The  world  would  take  care  of  the 
fair  philosopher  ;  what  prince  would  not  be  proud  to 
have  her  for  his  bride  ?  These  arguments  were  yielded 
to  by  the  feeble  old  man,  and  when  his  daughter  re- 
turned from  the  solitude  to  which  she  retired  with  her 
nurse  to  weep  for  his  departure,  she  found  that  all  her 
father's  fortune  had  been  divided  between  her  two  un- 
natural brothers. 

Finding  herself  thus  deserted  by  her  natural  protec- 
tors, Athenais  resolved  to  have  recourse  to  the  noble- 
minded  Empress,  the  pious  Pulcheria  Augusta.  She 
went  to  Constantinople  and  presented"  herself  to  the 
Empress.  She  had  previously  introduced  herself  by 
a  letter  to  Pulcheria,  who  had  appointed  an  hour 
and  a  day  when  she  would  receive  her.  Athenais  ap- 
proached with  a  trembling  step  the  palace  of  "Blacher- 
10* 


114  PULCHEEIA  AND  EUDOCIA.       [a.  D.  414-453. 

nse,  where  the  Empress  held  her  court.  She  was  at 
last  admitted  to  the  young  Empress,  who  was  seated 
under  a  richly  adorned  canopy,  surrounded  with  the 
great  men  of  the  Empire,  and  the  most  illustrious  state 
officers. 

She  told  her  story,  how  she  had  been  deprived  of  her 
patrimony  by  cruel  and  wicked  men  ;  but  she  refused 
to  tell  who  they  were.  When  she  announced  her  name, 
a  murmur  of  astonishment  went  through  the  assembly, 
for  the  fame  of  the  virtues  and  talents  of  the  fair  Athe- 
nais  were  well  known  at  the  court  of  the  virgin  Em- 
press. 

The  Empress  received  her  with  great  kindness,  and 
invited  her  to  visit  her  the  next  day,  when  she  received 
her  in  her  own  apartments.  Athenais  was  amazed  at 
the  contrast  between  the  royal  splendor  with  which  she 
had  seen  Pulcheria  surrounded  on  her  first  visit,  and  the 
simplicity  and  plainness  of  the  private  apartments  of  the 
royal  sisters.  They  received  the  young  Athenian  with 
the  greatest  kindness,  and  before  they  separated  it  was 
arranged  that  Athenais  should  be  received  into  their  lit- 
tle circle,  should  join  the  royal  sisters  in  their  studies 
and  their  labors  ;  and  thus  the  fair  orphan  found  herself 
established  in  the  imperial  palace. 

Among  the  occupations  of  the  youthful  Emperor  was 
that  of  painting.  He  was  at  that  time  engaged  in  a  pic- 
ture  intended  to  ornament  one  of  the  churches,  and  he 
begged  his  sister  to  allow  one  of  her  young  friends  to 
sit  to  him  as  the  model  of  a  Madonna.  Pulcheria  had 
become  so  much  interested  in  Athenais,  that  she  thought 
she  would  make  a  suitable  wife  for  her  brother,  who 


A.  D.  414-453.]   EUDOCIA  AND  HER  BROTHERS.      115 

had  intimated  to  his  sister  that  she,  who  had  heretofore 
provided  for  all  his  wishes,  should  select  for  him  a  com- 
panion for  life.  The  young  Empress  therefore  con- 
sented to  introduce  Athenais  to  her  brother  first  as  a  sit- 
ter, hoping  that  she  might  make  such  an  impression  on 
the  young  man,  that  he  would  be  willing  to  select  her 
for  a  wife.  The  wishes  of  Pulcheria  were  answered. 
The  young  Emperor  was  dazzled  by  her  great  beauty, 
was  charmed  by  her  graceful  and  modest  manners,  and 
soon  became  enamored  of  his  fair  model. 

In  the  mean  time  Athenais,  in  her  intercourse  with  the 
noble  sisters,  had  learned  to  take  an  interest  in  the  re- 
ligion which  made  them  so  good  and  disinterested  ;  she 
had  read  with  them  the  Scriptures ;  she  had  studied  the 
writings  of  Chrysostom  and  the  other  Christian  writers, 
in  which  they  took  so  much  delight ;  she  became  con- 
verted to  Christianity,  and  was  baptized  by  the  name  of 
Eudocia.  She  was  married  to  Theodosius  in  the  year 
421,  and  two  years  after  gave  birth  to  a  daughter.  She 
was  then  raised  to  the  rank  of  Augusta. 

Instead  of  visiting  her  unkind  brothers  with  any  pun- 
ishment for  their  ill  treatment  of  her,  Eudocia  sum- 
moned them  to  court,  and  gave  them  offices  of  honor 
and  of  profit.  Nor  did  the  splendor  and  magnificence 
of  the  station  to  which  she  was  raised  turn  her  mind 
away  from  her  early  love  of  study.  She  still  contin- 
ued to  give  much  of  her  time  to  literary  pursuits.  She 
made  a  paraphrase  in  verse  of  the  first  eight  books  of 
the  Old  Testament,  and  the  prophecies  of  Daniel  and 
Zechariah.  She  also  wrote  a  Life  of  St.  Cyprian,  and 
composed  a  panegyric  on  the  Persian  victories  of  Theo- 


116  PULCHERIA  AND  EUDOCIA.       [a.  D.  414-453. 

dosius.  She  was  also  the  author  of  a  singular  Life  of 
Christ,  composed  from  verses  picked  out  of  Homer,  an 
idea  not  peculiar  to  Eudocia,  but  practised  upon  bv 
other  writers  of  that  time. 

The  love  of  the  Emperor  for  his  wife  increased  as 
they  grew  older.  Her  influence  also  increased,  and  in 
some  measure  superseded  that  of  his  sister,  who  had 
still  continued  to  govern  the  state  with  her  usual  pru- 
dence and  discretion.  Pulcheria  appears,  however,  to 
have  made  great  efforts  to  induce  the  Emperor  to  take 
more  part  in  the  government.  One  artifice  which  she 
employed  for  this  purpose  was  somewhat  singular,  and 
appears  to  have  been  unfortunate  in  its  results. 

She  could  never  persuade  the  indolent  Theodosius  to 
read  the  papers  which  it  was  his  daily  duty  to  sign.  In 
order  to  make  him  feel  how  wicked  this  neglect  was, 
she  at  length,  after  many  fruhless  remonstrances,  drew 
up  a  paper  by  which  the  Emperor  sold  to  her  his 
wife  Eudocia.  Shortly  afterwards,  on  his  sending  for 
the  Empress,  who  was  in  Pulcheria's  apartments,  she 
refused  to  let  her  leave  them,  and  acquainted  the  Em- 
peror with  the  nature  of  the  paper  he  had  so  carelessly 
signed.  But  this  practical  lesson  was  rather  too  much 
for  the  feeble  Theodosius,  and  the  strong-minded  Athe- 
nais  was  still  less  pleased  with  it.  Probably  some  jeal- 
ousy of  the  power  of  her  noble  sister-in-law  might  have 
been  gathering  about  the  mind  of  the  wife  of  Theodo- 
sius. She  forgot  how  entirely  she  was  indebted  to  Pul- 
cheria for  all  she  enjoyed,  and  resolved  to  deprive  her 
of  the  power  she  had  so  long  used  in  so  exemplary 
a  manner. 


A.  D.  414-453.]       JEALOUSY  AT  COURT.  117 

For  this  purpose  she  persuaded  her  husband  to  have 
Pulcheria  made  a  deaconess,  an  office  which  was  some- 
times conferred  on  noble  ladies,  for  the  very  purpose 
for  which  Eudocia  now  used  it,  to  exclude  her  sis- 
ter from  the  court.  Theodosius  yielded  to  the  wishes 
of  his  wife,  and  ordered  Flavian,  Bishop  of  Constanti- 
nople, to  ordain  his  sister  to  this  office.  Flavian  refused 
to  do  this,  and  privately  advised  Pulcheria  to  go  into 
retirement,  lest  he  should  be  compelled  to  obey  the  Em- 
peror. She  accepted  his  advice,  left  the  palace,  and  re- 
tired to  a  country  seat,  in  the  plains  of  Hebdomon.  Her 
sisters  were  no  longer  living. 

But  Eudocia  was  far  inferior  to  her  sister-in-law  in 
virtue  and  the  power  to  govern,  though  she  may  have 
excelled  her  in  intellectual  attainments.  Her  rule  was 
marked  by  great  disorders  both  in  church  and  state. 
^Theodosius  at  last  became  jealous  of  his  wife,  and  ac- 
cused her  of  fondness  for  his  friend  Paulinus.  He  car- 
ried his  feeling  so  far  as  to  separate  from  Eudocia,  and 
put  Paulinus  to  death.  The  Empress  made  a  second 
pilgrimage  to  Jerusalem,  where  she  died  in  the  year 
460,  asserting  her  innocence  in  the  most  solemn  man- 
ner. 

Pulcheria,  in  her  retirement,  heard  of  the  fate  of  her 
brother's  wife.  She  also  learned  that  heresy  prevailed 
at  court ;  and  she  left  her  retirement,  and  returned  to 
the  palace.  She  expostulated  with  her  brother  upon  his 
religious  heresies,  and  the  evils  of  the  government  of 
the  eunuchs  which  he  had  authorized.  The  Emperor 
yielded  to  her  old  influence,  and  she  was  restored  to 
her  former  power,  soon  after  which  restoration  Theodo- 


118  PULCHERIA  ANP   EUDOCIA.        [a.  D.  414-453. 

sius  died,  in  the  year  450.  Pulcheria  was  then  unani- 
mously proclaimed  Empress  of  the  East,  and  was  the 
first  woman  to  whose  acknowledged  sway  the  Romans 
submitted. 

Pulcheria  showed  herself  equal  to  this  new  state  of 
things,  as  she  had  done  to  all  the  previous  situations  in 
which  she  had  been  placed.  She  was  then  fifty-one 
years  old  ;  but  feeling  that  the  whole  power  was  too 
great  for  her,  she  resolved  to  share  it  with  one  who  could 
assist  her  to  bear  its  burdens.  She  selected  Marcian, 
a  brave  general,  a  wise  statesman,  and  a  sincere  and 
zealous  Christian.  She  offered  to  marry  him,  and  in 
that  way  make  him  Emperor,  provided  he  would  con- 
sider himself  her  husband  only  in  name.  In  this  way 
she  may  be  thought  to  have  broken  the  vow  of  her 
youth,  but  she  had  probably  learned  by  experience  that 
it  is  unwise  to  make  rash  vows,  since  the  true  Christian, 
stands  always  ready  to  do  whatever  God  appoints  ;  and 
that,  if  a  rash  vow  has  been  made  which  circumstances 
prove  afterwards  to  be  unwise  or  wicked,  it  is  the  part 
of  wisdom  and  of  religion  to  break  it. 

Marcian  consented  to  share  the  labors  of  the  govern- 
ment with  Pulcheria.  They  were  married,  and  for  three 
years  conducted  the  affairs  of  state  with  great  energy 
and  wisdom.  Pulcheria  died  on  the  10th  of  September, 
in  the  year  453.  Marcian  survived  her  four  years,  and 
remained  sole  master  of  the  Empire. 

Pulcheria  met  her  death  piously  and  calmly.  She 
bequeathed  all  her  wealth  to  the  poor,  whom  she  anx- 
iously served  through  her  life,  and  she  was  made  a 
saint  after  her   death,  both   by  the  Greek  and  Roman 


A.  D.  570-633.]  MAHOMET.  119 

branches  of  the  Church.  Few  women  in  any  age  of  the 
world  have  been  called  to  positions  of  so  much  respon- 
sibility, and  few  have  shown,  as  far  as  history  has  re- 
vealed it  to  us,  a  more  perfect  character.  We  would 
gladly  know  more  of  a  life  which  appears  so  admirable 
and  so  worthy  of  imitation,  from  what  we  can  gather  of 
it  in  the  short  accounts  which  have  been  preserved  to 
us  in  ancient  history. 

NOTE  TO  CHAPTER  IX. 

This  is  the  first  of  our  lessons  in  which  we  have  been  able  to 
use  Miss  Julia  Kavanagh's  '•  Women  of  Christianity,"  a  delightful 
book,  wliich  we  recommend  to  young  readers,  and  to  those  Avho 
collect  libraries  for  them. 

It  becomes  necessary  to  pass  over  other  points  of  the  history  of 
the  Eonian  or  Greek  Empire.  The  history  of  the  Arian  contro- 
versy, the  position  of  the  Emiteror  Justinian,  and  the  great  code 
of  Christian  and  Roman  law  which  bears  his  name,  with  other 
points  of  the  fifth  and  sixth  centuries,  will  engage  the  attention  of 
careful  readers.  Milman's  History  closes  with  the  fourth  cen- 
tury.   After  that  period  consult  his  notes  to  Gibbon. 


CHAPTER    X. 

MAHOMET. 

The  temple  called  the  Caaba,  at  Mecca,  in  Arabia, 
was  a  place  for  all  sorts  of  worship.  Jews  were  there, 
and  Christians,  and  heathen.  For  the  Arabs  of  the  city 
were  a  careless,  refined  people,  who  did  not  often  trou- 
ble themselves  about  religion  ;  and  each  man  followed 
what  faith  he  liked,  and  most  men  followed  none.     So 


120  BIAHOMET.  [a.  d.  570  -  633 

in  their  great  temple  there  were  idols,  and  a  statue  of 
the  Virgin  Mary  and  her  child,  and  the  great  magic 
stone,  which  is  there  to  this  day,  which  was  said  to  have 
fallen  from  heaven.  And  one  person  worshipped  one, 
and  another  another,  without  much  faith,  but  with  no 
hindrance. 

One  day  when  the  Koreischites,  a  powerful  tribe 
there,  held  a  feast  in  honor  of  their  idols,  four  men,  of 
more  sense  than  the  rest  of  them,  met  together,  away 
from  the  crowd.  "  All  this  is  wrong,"  they  said.  "  This 
is  not  the  religion  of  Abraham.'"  And  the  Arabs  then, 
as  now,  believed  that  they  were  descended  from  Abra- 
ham through  his  son  Ishmael.  "  What  is  this  mock 
god,  around  whom  they  are  making  these  processions, 
and  who  receives  all  these  sacrifices  ?  We  will  find 
out  the  truth  ;  and  to  find  it,  let  us  travel  through  foreign 
lands,  if  we  must,  till  we  come  to  it."  So  they  bound 
themselves  to  each  other  to  find  the  truth.  Their  names 
were  W^araca,  and  Othman,  and  Obeydallah,  and  Zeyd. 

Waraca  went  to  the  Jews  and  the  Christians.  He  stud- 
ied their  books,  and  he  made  sure  that  God  was  going  to 
send  another  prophet  to  the  earth,  and  that  this  time  the 
prophet  would  be  an  Arab.  He  described  this  prophet 
as  well  as  he  could.  And  at  last  one  day  Khadidja, 
his  cousin,  came  to  him,  and  told  him  that  her  husband 
Mahomet  had  had  a  vision.  During  a  month  of  fasting, 
he  lay  wrapt  in  his  mantle  in  a  cave.  He  heard  a  voice 
calling  on  him,  and  uncovered  his  head.  A  flood  of 
light  burst  upon  him,  so  bright  that  he  swooned  away. 
As  he  recovered,  he  saw  an  angel  standing,  which 
showed  to  him  a  cloth  written  over,  and  bade  him  read. 


A.  D.  570-633.]       THE    TRUTH-SEEKERS.  121 

"  I  know  not  how  to  read  !  "  said  Mahomet. 

"Read!"  repUed  the  angel,  "in  the  name  of  the 
Lord,  who  has  created  all  things  ;  who  created  man 
from  a  clot  of  blood.  Read  in  the  name  of  the  Most 
High,  who  taught  men  the  use  of  the  pen  ;  who  sheds 
on  his  soul  the  ray  of  knowledge,  and  teaches  him  what 
before  he  knew  not." 

Mahomet  felt  at  once  that  he  was  enlightened  from 
above.  He  read  the  scroll,  which  contained  decrees 
afterwards  written  in  the  Koran.  The  angel  heard 
him,  and  then  said,  "  Thou  art  the  prophet  of  God, — 
and  I  am  the  angel  Gabriel,"  —  and  vanished. 

Khadidja  told  her  cousin  of  this  vision.  And  the 
wise  Waraca  declared  that  Mahomet  was  the  very- 
prophet  he  had  waited  for.  And  soon  he  died.  But 
his  words  confirmed  Mahomet  in  the  belief  that  he  was 
the  prophet  of  God. 

Othman,  another  of  the  four  truth-seekers,  set  out  to 
travel ;  questioning  all  who  could  give  him  any  light. 
Some  Christians  instructed  him  in  their  faith,  and  he 
went  to  Constantinople,  where  he  was  baptized.  Obey- 
dallah  waited,  uncertain,  till  Mahomet  appeared, — 
then  tried  to  believe  in  him,  failed,  and  also  became  a 
Christian.  Zeyd  neither  studied  nor  travelled  at  first, 
but  went  every  day  to  the  temple  and  prayed  God  for 
light.  There  he  might  be  seen  resting  against  the  wall 
of  the  temple,  in  pious  meditation,  in  which  he  would 
cry  out,  "  Lord  !  if  only  I  knew  how  to  serve  thee,  1 
would  obey  thee  ;  but  I  know  not!"  Then  he  wouid 
fling  himself  down  with  his  face  on  the  ground.  Learn- 
ing something  from  what  the  Jews  told  him,  and  sonie- 

NO.      VTTT.  jl 


122  MAHOMET.  [a.  D.  570-633. 

thing  from  what  the  Christians  told  him,  he  tried  to  make 
a  religion  of  his  own,  and  worship  as  Abraham  wor- 
shipped. He  attacked  the  idol  worship  of  the  Caaba, 
and  so  was  driven  from  the  city.  Wherever  he  went, 
he  talked  of  religion  with  all  the  learned  men.  At  last 
he  met  a  wise  monk,  who  told  him  that  there  had  ap- 
peared at  Mecca  an  Arab  prophet,  who  preached  the 
religion  of  Abraham.  It  was  what  poor  Zeyd  was  seek- 
ing for.  And  he  turned  to  Mecca  again.  But  as  he 
went,  a  band  of  robbers  met  him  and  put  him  to  death. 

This  account  of  the  four  truth-seekers  is  an  old  Arab 
story.  Whether  exactly  true  or  not,  it  shows  truly  the 
unsettled,  anxious  state  of  the  people  to  whom  Mahomet, 
when  he  was^^orty  years  old,  announced  that  there  was 
one  God,  and  Mahomet  was  his  prophet.  There  were 
enough  teachers  there  before.  Christians,  Jews,  and 
"  Come -outers,"  like  Zeyd,  to  teach  that  there  was  one 
God.  Indeed,  men  of  the  race  of  Shem's  sons,  as 
the  Arabs  were,  have  never  readily  believed  any  thing 
else,  when  they  believed  at  all.  But  this  was  taught  by 
careless  men,  in  a  careless  way.  All  these  idols,  and 
forms,  and  mixtures  of  worships,  had  come  in,  so  that 
searchers  for  truth  did  not  find  it,  —  and  wandered  lost 
and  sad.  To  such  a  people  Mahomet  addressed  his 
straightforward  appeal,  declaring,  "  There  is  one  God, 
and  Mahomet  is  his  prophet." 

He  was  as  much  startled  by  his  first  vision,  whatever 
it  was,  as  were  those  around  him.  But  Waraca  con- 
firmed him  in  his  resolution  to  carry  it  out,  and  his 
faithful  wife  Khadidja  believed  him.  He  never  forgot 
her  faith.    "  When  I  was  poor,"  said  he,  after  she  had 


A.  D.  570-633.]  THE    BOY    ALL  123 

died,  "  she  enriched  me  ;  when  others  said  I  lied,  she 
believed  me  ;  when  I  was  cursed  by  my  nation,  she  was 
faithful  to  me  ;  and  the  more  I  suffered,  the  more  she 
loved  me."  She  was  the  first  believer ;  then  came  his 
slave  Zeid,  and  his  friend  Abu-Beker,  and  his  young 
cousin  Ali.  Three  years  of  secret  teaching  brought  to 
him  fourteen  proselytes  ;  in  the  fourth  year  he  assumed 
the  prophet's  office  publicly  ;  he  prepared  a  banquet  and 
called  all  the  faithful,  with  other  guests  of  his  own  fam- 
ily, to  feast  with  him.  Then  he  announced  his  new  duty, 
and  asked,  "  Who  among  you  will  support  my  burden  ? 
Who  among  you  will  be  my  companion  and  vizier  ?  " 
They  were  all  silent,  in  doubt  and  contempt,  till  the  boy 
Ali,  then  thirteen  years  old,  having  waited  in  vain  for  his 
elders,  cried  out,  "  O  prophet,  I  am  the  man,  I  will  be 
thy  vizier  over  them."  Mahomet  accepted  the  ofler 
eagerly,  "  Behold  my  brother,"  he  cried,  "  my  vice- 
gerent, my  vizier  ;  let  all  listen  to  his  words  and  obey 
him."  The  kinsmen  of  the  boy  laughed  at  his  presump- 
tion. But  he  persevered  in  his  allegiance.  He  became 
indeed  the  successor  of  Mahomet ;  and  the  name  of  Ali 
is  now  a  sacred  name  to  half  the  Mussulman  world. 

The  energy  and  spirit  of  a  boy  shows  itself  thus  in 
the  history  of  that  faith,  as  we  have  seen  it,  once  and 
again,  in  the  scenes  of  Christian  history  which  we  have 
been  studying. 

They  labored  with  little  success  in  Mecca.  As  soon 
as  the  new  sect  was  strong  enough  to  attract  attention, 
they  were  driven  from  Mecca,  and  Mahomet  fled  to 
Medina,     This  was  the  Hegira,*  or  flight,  from  which 

»  *  Pronounced  Hij-e-ra, 


124  MAHOMET.  [a.  D.  570  -  633. 

the  Mahometans  reckon  time.  It  was  in  our  year  622. 
Medina  received  him,  he  became  king  and  priest  there, 
gathered  strength,  and  constantly  made  revelations  to 
the  faithful.  Seven  years  afterwards  he  was  strong 
enough  to  capture  the  city  of  Mecca,  and  to  make  it 
the  capital  of  his  kingdom.  This  conquest  made  him 
master  of  the  Arabian  tribes  ;  and,  though  this  and 
other  wars  with  diflerent  unruly  and  faithless  bands  and 
people  kept  him  a  soldier  till  he  died  in  632,  still  when 
he  died  there  was  no  considerable  part  of  Arabia  which 
did  not  own  in  words,  that  "  there  is  one  God,  and 
Mahomet  is  his  prophet." 

His  death  happened  as  an  army  was  on  its  march  to 
the  conquest  of  Syria  and  the  Holy  Land.  "  God  be 
with  me  in  the  death-struggle,"  he  prayed,  and  then, 
as  his  wife  rested  his  head  upon  her  lap,  he  cooled  his 
face  with  the  water  she  held  for  him.  "  O  God,  be  it 
so,"  he  murmured,  —  "among  my  fellow-spirits  in 
paradise,"  and  died. 

"  I  knew,"  said  she,  "  that  his  last  moment  had  come, 
and  that  he  had  made  choice  of  the  life  above." 

Her  outcries  called  a  crowd,  who  looked  amazed 
upon  the  corpse.  "  Dead  !  "  they  cried.  "  Is  not  ho 
our  mediator  with  God  ?  How  can  he  be  dead?  IJe 
is  in  a  trance,  and  carried  up  to  heaven,  as  JesUs  and 
the  other  prophets  were."  Omar,  one  of  his  great 
generals,  arrived  in  the  midst  of  the  confusion.  Wv 
drew  his  sword,  and  declared  he  would  cut  off  the  head 
of  any  one  who  said  the  prophet  could  die.  "  He  has 
departed  for  a  time,"  said  he,  "  as  Moses  went  forty 
days  into  the  mountain;  and  like   him  he   will  reluni 


A.  D.  570-633.]       MUSSULMAN    CONQUESTS.  125 

again."  But  the  wise  Abu-Beker,  whom  Mahomet  had 
made  his  successor  in  the  direction  of  religion,  came 
und  said,  "  Did  you  worship  Mahomet,  or  the  God  of 
Mahomet  ?  God  cannot  die.  But  God  has  told  you  in 
ihe  Koran,  that  Mahomet  was  his  prophet  and  would 
die.  Will  you  turn  your  heel  upon  him,  and  abandon 
his  doctrine  because  he  is  dead  ?  If  you  do,  you  honor 
not  God,  but  condemn  yourselves.  And  God's  bless- 
ino-s  will  remain  for  the  faithful." 

The  despair  of  the  people  subsided.  These  coun- 
sellors around  Mahomet's  dead  body  carried  farther  his 
conquests.  And  with  such  zeal  as  this  scene  shows, 
Omar,  and  Abu-Beker,  and  Ali,  and  their  generals, 
before  that  century  had  ended,  had  carried  the  sign  of 
the  crescent,  Mahomet's  banner,  and  the  simple  faith 
which  he  declared,  through  Western  Asia  and  Northern 
Africa ;  and  in  the  next  century  they  were  battling  the 
Christians  in  Spain. 

This  rapid  conquest  of  theirs  was,  in  its  external 
effects  on  Christendom,  the  most  severe  blow  Christen- 
dom ever  had.  Christianity  has  never  regained  any  of 
those  conquests,  except  Spain  and  Algiers.  It  is  true 
that  real  Christianity  has  had  far  more  terrible  enemies 
than  Mahomet.  Constantino  proved  such,  in  the  result 
of  his  friendship  for  the  Church.  Some  of  the  stronger 
Popes  have  done  it  far  more  evil  than  ever  Mahomet 
could  do.  Mahomet,  however,  in  the  wars  of  his  fol- 
lowers, wrested  from  it  more  territory  than  any  enemy 
has  ever  done.  For  centuries  the  Mussulman  arms 
were  the  terror  and  reproach  of  Christian  nations. 

The  reasons  of  this  triumph  may  be  simply  sta'    ' 
11* 


12G  MAHOMET.  [a.  D.  570-633. 

Mahomet  gained  an  absolute  sway  over  his  people,  be- 
cause he  really  believed  what  he  taught,  that  there  was 
a  God,  —  one  God,  —  not  to  be  honored  by  image- 
worship,  or  by  labored  forms  of  any  kind  ;  but  to  be 
absolutely  obeyed.  This  was  Mahomet's  living  faith. 
With  the  decision  it  gave  him,  with  the  energy  it  com- 
pelled, it  made  him  ruler  of  all  around  him.  They 
pretended  to  believe  it  too.  Some  of  them  did,  as 
heartily  and  simply  as  he  did.  Most  of  them  did  not. 
It  was  a  lip  faith  which  they  rendered.  From  Job's 
time  down,  the  Arabs  had  supposed  there  was  one  God, 
and  really  only  one.  But  they  were  indifferent  as  to 
his  worship,  and  careless  as  to  his  will.  All  the  more 
were  they  the  weak  and  willing  followers  of  bmve  men 
like  Mahomet,  who  did  believe  him  to  be  at  hand,  their 
immediate  guide  in  war,  in  doctrine,  or  at  home.  With 
-this  faith,  perfectly  pure  at  first,  and  even  in  his  am- 
bitious days,  left  uncriticized  by  himself,  Mahomet  com- 
posed the  chapters  of  the  Koran,  which  then,  as  now, 
commanded  the  immediate  reverence,  as  the  direct 
words  of  God,  of  those  who,  having  taken  the  highest 
name,  claim  no  other,  but  are  known  as  "  the  Faithful," 
full  of  faith  in  one  God.  When  Otba  first  heard  the 
Koran,  he  cried,  "  Mahomet  has  spoken  as  I  never  heard 
before.  It  is  not  poetry,  it  is  not  prose,  it  is  not  magic  ; 
but  it  pierces  me  through  and  through." 

This  real  faith  of  Mahomet's  and  of  his  immediate 
followers  was  enough  to  give  them  their  power  over 
their  soldiers  and  people.  He  probably  never  pre- 
tended to  work  miracles.  His  accounts  of  miracles  are 
always  the  angel  Gabriel's.     And  though  the  Persian 


A.  I).  570-633.]       MUSSULMAN    FAITH.  127 

Mussulmans  surrounded  his  life  v/ith  wonders,  his  own 
Arabians  are  much  more  sparing  of  them,  and  show 
him  in  as  simple  traits  as  if  he  were  not  a  wonderful 
man.  They  tell  how  he  opened  the  door  that  his  cat 
might  go  to  drink,  how  he  played  with  his  grandchil- 
dren, Hasan  and  Hosein,  "jumped"  them  and  danced 
with  them,  and  talked  to  them  in  baby-talk,  which  is 
repeated  to  this  day.  With  so  little  of  pretence  did  he 
maintain  the  reverence  of  his  soldiers. 

Their  faith,  and  the  faith  of  the  terrible  Mussulman 
warriors  who  came  after  them,  was  not  so  deep  as  his. 
They  believed  in  God  no  more  earnestly,  perhaps,  than 
did  the  pretended  Christians  or  the  heathen  whom  they 
conquered.  But  they  did  believe  heartily,  that,  whoever 
God  was,  he  had  sent  them  to  sweep  from  the  earth  a 
crowd  of  faithless  faiths  and  of  false  professors,  who 
had  lived  long  enough  for  his  purposes  in  the  world. 
And  here  they  were  perfectly  right.  The  dissolute 
Greek  Emperors,  and  the  bishops  under  them,  who 
were  forgetting  their  Lord  and  Saviour  while  they 
quarrelled  about  his  nature,  and  the  people  of  the  first 
Christian  lands,  now  wholly  given  over  to  an  adoration 
of  images  and  relics,  were  all  in  themselves  useless  for 
Christ's  kingdom.  Yet  God  never  deserts  his  world. 
He  is  never  without  a  witness  in  the  courses  of  his  his- 
tory. So  he  ordered  that,  where  the  Greek  Emperor 
Justinian  had  wasted  Samaria,  in  wanton  cruelty,  that 
wasted  province  should  be  the  undefended  gate  through 
which  the  Mussulman  hordes  should  pour  down  on  his 
successor's  empire.  So  he  ordered  that  the  Christians, 
who  had  persecuted  each  other  under  the  names  of 


128  MAHOMET.  [a.  d.  570  -  633. 

Arian  and  Athanasian,  should  prove  too  much  divided 
to  stand  firm  together  against  any  invader.  So  he 
ordered,  that  men  who  had  talked  about  Jesus's  nature 
till  they  failed  to  feel  the  power  of  his  life,  should  give 
way  everywhere,  half  distrusting  their  own  dead  creed, 
indeed,  before  passion-led  armies,  who  did  believe 
"  Mahomet  is  God's  prophet,"  if  they  had  little  faith 
beside.  In  this  way  God  did  send  those  armies  to 
break  up  the  rotten  dynasties  of  the  earth.  They 
knew  he  sent  them.  Even  those  dynasties  feared  he 
sent  them.  And  so  the  Mussulman  triumph  was  se- 
cure. 

NOTES    TO    CHAPTER    X. 

"  The  Arabian  Nights'  Entertainment"  furnishes  constant  illus- 
tration of  Mahomet's  religion ;  as  well  as  of  many  Eastern  cus- 
toms mentioned  in  the  Bible. 

Ining's  Life  of  Mahomet. 

Irving's  Successors  of  Mahomet. 

The  Hyat-ul  Kaloob  is  the  Persian  history  of  Mahomet,  trans- 
lated from  the  original.  The  Persian  writers  add  a  great  deal  of 
wild,  Eastern  romance  to  the  accounts  of  the  Arabs.  Rev.  Mr. 
Merrick's  translation  is  published  by  Phillips,  Sampson,  &  Co. 
Boston,  1849. 

In  Carlyle's  Heroes,  W.  H.  Perkins's  Writings,  Maurice's 
Boyle  Lectures  on  the  Religions  of  the  World,  are  valuable  essays 
on  Mahomet.  These  are  easily  procured  here,  except  the  last, 
which  ought  to  be  reprinted. 

Hon.  William  Sullivan's  "  Historical  Causes  and  Effects  from 
476  A.  D.  to  1517  A.  D.,"  a  very  valuable  book,  begins  to  be  of  ser- 
vice from  the  period  first  named.  Boston :  James  B.  Dow. 
1837.     pp.  612. 

Rev.  S.  Osgood's  Studies  in  Christian  Biography  begin  with 
lives  as  early  as  Augustine,  Jerome,  and  Chrysostom,  and  come 
down  as  late  as  Swedenborg.     C.  S.  Erancis,  New  York. 


A,  D.  616-683.]     cLOvis  and  his  vow.  129 


CHAPTER    XI. 

CHRISTIANS    MADE    BARBAROUS,  AS    THE    BARBARIANS  ARE 
CONVERTED. ST.    LEGER. 

The  events  at  which  we  have  looked  have  all  passed 
in  civilized  countries.  But,  as  has  been  said,  the  Chris- 
tian missionaries  meanwhile  were  extending  the  power 
of  the  cross,  or  its  name,  beyond  the  regions  of  the  Ro- 
man Empire.  In  the  time  of  Augustine,  even,  the 
western  provinces  of  Rome  were  beginning  to  give  way 
before  barbarian  attacks,  v/hile  the  Roman  legions  were 
drawn  home  to  take  care  of  the  Roman  capitals.  Those 
barbarians  became  more  and  more  insulting.  But  the 
Christian  missionaries  of  those  times  met  them  even 
more  readily  than  the  troops  who  should  have  repelled 
them.  And  when  Clovis,  the  first  successful  invader  of 
Gaul,  at  the  head  of  his  Franks,  had  succeeded  in  mount- 
ing the  throne  of  that  disturbed  province,  the  Christian 
bishops  of  the  day  succeeded  also  in  gaining  his  alle- 
giance, in  name,  to  their  faith.  His  wife  was  a  Christian 
princess  of  Burgundy.  The  history  of  his  conversion  (9  I  (O 
will  show  what  such  conversions  were  worth,  —  how  far 
the  real  Church  suffered  from  them,  and  how  little  the 
converts  gained  from  them.  The  Germans  were  threat- 
ening to  pass  the  Rhine.  The  Franks  called  Clovis  to 
their  command  to  resist  them.  During  the  battle,  he 
vowed  that,  if  he  gained  it,  his  wife's  god  should  be  his 
god.  He  did  gain  it,  —  kept  his  vow,  —  was  baptized  ; 
and  three  thousand  of  his  warriors  followed  his  example. 


130  ST.  LEGER.  [a.  d.  616-683. 

When  they  came  to  tell  the  new  convert  some  of  the 
history  of  the  faith  which  he  had  thus  assumed,  and 
dwelt  on  our  Lord's  torture  at  the  hands  of  Jews 
and  Romans  on  Calvary,  the  new  Christian  cried  out, 
"  Oh  !  if  I  had  been  there  with  my  Franks,  I  would 
have  avenged  him  for  such  agonies."  With  such  Chris- 
tianity among  its  kings,  France  became  an  independent 
nation  ;  the  rule  of  the  dying  Roman  Empire  gradually 
falling  entirely  away. 

In  fact,  however,  its  kings  were  not  its  rulers.  While 
the  imbecile  Greek  and  Roman  emperors  were  ciphers 
in  the  hands  of  the  leading  priests  of  their  nations,  these 
Frank  kings  were  the  generals  who  did  the  fighting  of 
a  land  which  was  really  governed  by  its  bishops  and 
clergy.  The  Bishop  of  Vienne  wrote  to  Clovis,  "  When 
thou  fightest,  it  is  to  us  that  victory  is  due."  So,  again, 
when  on  the  eve  of  a  campaign  the  king  once  sent  to 
consult  the  dead  St.  Martin  at  Tours,  as  to  what  he 
should  do.  As  the  messengers  entered  the  church,  they 
heard  the  words  of  a  psalm  which  describes  a  victory, 
and  they  carried  this  news  to  Clovis.  This  encouraged 
him  to  go  on  and  conquer.  With  such  influence  over 
the  kings,  the  priests  used  the  revenues  of  the  kingdom 
much  as  they  chose.  The  monasteries,  where  their 
more  laborious  and  more  gentle  students  and  recluses 
assembled,  grew  richer  and  richer.  King  Clovis  gave 
to  St.  Remigius  all  the  land  he  could  walk  around  while 
he  took  his  noon  nap.  The  saint  took  a  long  walk,  and 
the  grant  remained  for  many  centuries  with  the  church 
at  Rheims. 

We  will  look  at  some  of  the  details  of  such  a  state  of 


A.  D.  616-683.]         LIFE  IN  MONASTERIES.  ]31 

things,  as  they  come  together  in  the  hfe  of  Leger,  now 
the  St.  Leger  of  the  Cathohc  Church,  —  a  great  poli- 
tician of  those  days ;  king  for  years,  except  in  name ; 
and  in  name  the  Bishop  of  the  See  of  Autun. 

While  Mahomet  was  in  exile  from  Mecca,  in  the  year 
616,  St.  Leger  was  born.  In  the  year  683  he  died, — 
after  Mahomet  had  founded  his  faith  and  em|)ire.  As 
his  life  went  on  in  the  intrigues  and  politics  of  France, 
he  heard  sometimes  of  such  calamities  as  the  fall  of  Je- 
rusalem, and  of  invasions  of  one  and  another  Christian 
province  by  these  ruthless  Saracens.  But  he  had  too 
many  fightings  near  home  to  be  able  to  pay  much 
thought  to  them  or  to  theirs,  and  he  hardly  conceived 
that  in  his  own  days  there  was  rising,  far  from  him,  the 
power  which  should  be  one  of  the  greatest  enemies  of 
the  Christian  Church. 

Leger's  uncle  was  Bishop  of  Poitiers,  a  prudent  man, 
and  immensely  rich,  as  in  those  times  bishops  were. 
Not  so  much  from  any  religious  turn,  as  because  the 
Church  offices  were  the  offices  of  special  influence, 
Leger  studied  to  be  a  priest.  He  was  a  careful  student 
in  their  way  of  study,  —  which  to  us  would  be  very 
strange.  He  probably  was  at  the  college  of  Rheims, 
which  was  endowed  in  part  by  the  long  noon  walk  of 
Remigius,  and  existed  for  four  or  five  centuries.  When 
he  was  old  enough,  his  uncle  made  him  Archdeacon  of 
Poitiers,  his  own  see.  This  was  a  different  thing  from 
becoming  a  monk.  For,  just  as  the  Church  had  origi- 
nally been  the  refuge  for  quiet  and  devoted  spirits,  who 
renounced  the  temptations  of  the  world,  so  now  the 
monks'   houses,  or  monasteries,  became  the  refuge  of 


132  ST.  LEGER.  [a.  d.  616  -  683. 


such  spirits,  when  they  renounced  the  activity  and 
temptations  of  the  Church.  The  young  Leger  had  no 
such  disposition.  He  went  into  the  Church,  and  be- 
came Archdeacon  of  Poitiers,  just  as  a  young  Ameri- 
can studies  law  when  he  is  ambitious  of  political  influ- 
ence ;  or  as  a  young  Englishman  goes  into  the  House 
of  Commons.  Among  the  clergy  who  were  not  monks 
were  all  those  men  of  business  who  really  controlled 
the  state  and  society.  Kings  and  armies  called  for  the 
hands  and  energies  of  young  men  of  adventurous  and 
energetic  disposition,  such  as  now  make  themselves 
merchants,  or  seamen,  or  workmen  in  whatever  active 
labor.  But  as  society  arranged  itself,  these  men  were 
then  under  the  control  of  the  ambitious  leaders  of  the 
Church,  who  were  kings  m  every  thing  but  the  name.  ■ 

Leger  grew  up  at  Poitiers,  a  good  man  of  business, 
and  a  respectable  priest.  He  got  the  favor  of  the  queen, 
and  she,  when  he  was  forty-five  years  old,  made  him 
Bishop  of  Autun,  a  large  town  in  the  veiy  heart  of 
France.  Little  enough  was  this  like  Paul's  making 
Timothy  Bishop  of  Ephesus.  It  was  not  that  he  might 
take  care  of  the  poor,  or  convert  sinners,  or  comfort 
the  broken-hearted,  that  he  was  put  there  ;  but  that  he 
might  be  one  of  the  rulers  of  France. 

The  kings  of  that  day  are  called  the  do-nothing 
kings,*  and  rightly  enough  called  so.  Mr.  Hallam  says, 
that  in  that  whole  century  there  was  not  a  person  or  ac- 
tion in  France  worth  mention.  But  the  biographer  of 
Leger  did  not  think  so.  After  Leger  became  bishop, 
he    says    he    so    applied    his    soul    to    keeping    God's 

*  Les  rois  faineans. 


A.  D.  616-683.]      DAGOBERT's    FUNERAL.  133 

commandments,  that  his  will  became  so  powerful  that 
the  Lord  enabled  him  always  and  without  difficulty  to 
gain  all  things  which  he  had  resolved  to  accomplish. 
This  is  strong  language,  which  the  history  hardly  bears 
out.  For  poor  Leger  spent  many  years  in  captivity, 
was  blinded,  and  suffered  much  in  other  ways,  before 
his  violent  death. 

It  is  quite  easy  to  see  why  the  do-nothing  kings  did 
nothing.  The  clergy  of  the  time  did  their  real  work 
for  them.  There  is  a  long  account  of  the  death-bed  of 
Dagobert,  who  died  when  Leger  was  a  young  man. 
He  was  surrounded  by  priests  and  other  grandees,  and 
made  a  long  speech,  they  say,  in  which  he  left  to  the 
Church  much  valuable  property ;  and  ended  by  saying, 
"  We  believe  that,  with  the  aid  of  God,  this  will  afford 
something  for  the  poor,  in  whom  we  have  been  often 
interested,  and  that  they,  living  thus  by  our  alms,  will 
pray  more  abundantly  and  more  devotedly  for  the  sal- 
vation of  our  soul."  He  certainly  needed  such  hope, 
for  a  more  licentious  or  wicked  man  never  lived.  But 
the  history  goes  on  to  say,  "  Embalmed  with  spices,  his 
body  was  borne,  in  the  midst  of  the  assembly  of  lament- 
ing people,  into  the  mausoleum  of  the  holy  martyrs, 
which  he  had  adorned  with  gold,  and  with  precious 
stones.  He  was  buried,  very  properly,  at  the  right  of 
their  tomb  !  "  Leger  was  surrounded,  through  his  life, 
by  one  and  another  of  such  kings.  The  life  of  a  bishop 
was  spent  in  making  the  most  of  them  and  of  their  fears. 
At  one  time  he  himself  became  Mayor  of  the  Palace, 
or  prime  minister,  with  absolute  power.  This  was  with 
the  alliance  of  the  queen  of  the  time.     Such  a  position 

NO.    VIII.  12 


134  ST.    LEGER.  [a.  D.  616 -683. 

exposed  him  to  constant  quarrels  with  other  ambitious 
men. 

Here  is  an  account  of  a  scene  which  took  place  be- 
tween him  and  one  of  the  kings,  as  related  by  an  ad- 
mirer of  the  bishop,  which  will  give  some  idea  of  the 
civilization  and  Christianity  to  which  they  had  all  at- 
tained. 

"  The  night  when  they  celebrated  Easter  at  Autun, 
the  king,  as  if  he  were  afraid  of  something,  did  not 
choose  to  go  into  the  cathedral,  but  with  a  little  com- 
pany of  attendants  went  to  the  hypocrite  we  have 
spoken  of,  and  even  dared  to  partake  of  the  holy  com- 
munion there.  After  this,  and  having  been  drinking, 
passing  madly  through  the  cathedral,  he  called  Leger 
by  his  name,  as  if  the  bishop  had  fled  from  the  rumor 
that  the  king  was  going  to  kill  him.  But  he  found  the 
bishop  boldly  waiting  him  in  the  place  of  baptism,  and 
there  the  king  himself  stood,  stupefied  by  the  light  of  the 
lamps  and  the  odor  of  the  holy  ointment ;  and  when  the 
bishop  replied  to  him,  '  I  am  here,'  he  passed  abashed 
from  his  presence.  The  bishop  boldly  followed  him, 
and  asked  a  reason  for  his  violence.  The  king  had  no 
reason  to  give,  and  the  bishop  left  him  in  trouble  at  the 
recollection  of  his  sacrilege." 

This  distress  did  not  last  long,  however.  One  of  the 
bishop's  friends  was  killed,  and  he  was  imprisoned.  He 
found  in  the  prison  his  greatest  enemy,  Ebroin,  who,  in 
the  fortunes  of  party,  had  been  imprisoned  also.  In  the 
years  which  they  spent  there,  they  were  reconciled  to 
each  other  ;  and  when  the  king  died,  they  left  the  prison 
as  if  friends.    At  this  time  one  of  his  enemies  attempted 


A.  D.  616-683.]     THE    TREASURES    DISTRIBUTED.  135 

to  assassinate  the  bishop.  "  But,"  says  the  history,  "  as 
he  came  near  him  he  was  seized  with  such  terrible  fear 
that  he  acknowledged  his  crime,  fell  at  his  feet,  and 
begged  his  pardon." 

The  history  goes  on  to  say,  that  men  knew  that  evil 
was  impending,  because  there  appeared  in  the  heavens 
"  that  star  which  the  astrologers  call  a  comet,  the  appa- 
rition of  which  is  a  sign  that  the  world  will  be  troubled 
by  famine,  by  the  change  of  kings,  by  attacks  from  the 
Gentiles,  and  the  evils  of  war."  War  enough,  and  evils 
enough,  followed  the  comet ;  but  it  would  be  hard  to 
say  that  there  were  then  more  than  in  the  years  before 
it  was  seen.  In  one  of  these  wars,  of  which  no  man 
knows  the  cause,  if,  indeed,  any  man  ever  knew  it, 
Ebroin,  having  with  his  captivity  renounced  his  friend- 
ship for  his  old  enemy,  marched  an  army  against  him 
and  his  city,  Autun.  The  people  thronged  around  him 
and  begged  him  to  buy  peace  with  the  treasures  of  the 
town  and  church.  But  he  said,  "  My  brothers,  I  have 
kept  faithfully  all  these  treasures  which  I  now  show  to 
you,  as  long  as  God  has  given  me  favor  with  the  men 
of  my  time.  I  have  kept  them  for  the  ornament  and 
glory  of  the  Church.  Now  that  these  men  are  excited 
against  me,  and  God  wishes  to  call  me  to  heavenly 
favor,  why  should  I  surround  myself  with  wealth  which 
cannot  follow  me."  So  he  sent  for  silversmiths,  who 
broke  up  the  sacred  vases,  and  he  distributed  them  to 
all  the  poor  people,  —  to  the  widows  and  orphans  of  the 
town.  And  then,  confident  in  their  good-will,  he  await- 
ed the  enemy. 

They  surrounded  the  town,  and  attacked  it  eagerly. 


136  ST.   LEGER.  [a.  D.  616-683. 

The  citizens  maintained  themselves.  But  after  a  day 
Leger  forbade  any  more  fighting, —  bade  adieu  to  all 
his  brethren, —  partook  of  the  communion, —  comforted 
those  around  him,  —  and  then,  going  to  the  gates,  threw 
them  open  and  offered  himself  to  those  who  sought  his 
life.  "  They  received  him  as  wolves  do  a  lamb." 
They  tortured  him  in  the  most  terrible  way,  —  tearing 
out  his  eyes  and  his  tongue,  —  and  sent  him  into  con- 
finement in  a  lonely  monastery,  pretending  that  he  was 
dead. 

The  narratives  of  these  times  are  all  written  by  monks 
of  the  same  or  the  next  centuries,  and  abound  in  super- 
stitious accounts  of  miracles  by  which  those  fighting  in 
these  wars  were  assisted.  Some  of  these  are  ludicrous, 
but  all  of  them  are  sad,  because  they  show  how  poor 
was  the  best  idea  of  Christian  power.  We  have  already 
given  an  account  of  one  of  St.  Martin's  directions  for  a 
battle.  Here  is  an  event  said  to  have  happened  in  his 
church,  by  a  French  writer  to  whom  we  owe  part  of 
this  history. 

"Another  barbarian,  trying  to  mount  on  the  altar  of 
the  same  church,  consecrated  to  St.  Martin  of  Tours, 
put  his  hand  on  one  of  the  corners  of  the  altar ;  but  his 
hand  at  once  attached  itself  to  the  marble,  and  he  could 
not  take  it  away.  As  his  companions  did  not  wish  to 
leave  him  there,  they  broke  the  part  of  the  stone  which 
his  hand  held,  by  blows  of  a  mallet,  and  took  him  with 
them,  carrying,  to  his  great  regret,  the  piece  of  stone 
for  ever  joined  firm  to  his  hand.  And  captives  who  have 
since  returned  to  France  say  that  he  went  thus  back  to 
his  own  country,  and  that  his  arm  had  withered  ;  and  he 


A.  D.  616-683.]  HIS    DEATH.  137 

confessed  that  this  misfortune  happened  to  him  through 
the  power  of  St.  Basle." 

Before  Leger  died,  his  friends  surrounded  him  again, 
and  by  a  miracle,  as  they  thought,  he  regained  the  pow- 
er of  speech,  although  his  lips  and  tongue  had  been  cut 
off.  At  length,  four  executioners  were  sent  to  kill  him. 
They  took  him  into  a  forest  to  do  so.  And  he  said  to 
them,  "  I  will  not  weary  you  any  longer,  my  children  ; 
do  at  once  that  which  you  have  come  to  do,  and  fulfil 
the  wish  of  the  wicked."  But  three  of  them,  overpow- 
ered, fell  at  his  feet,  and  begged  him  to  pardon  them, 
and  to  grant  them  his  blessing.  The  fourth  remained 
firm,  drew  his  sword,  and,  after  Leger  had  prayed 
and  bidden  him  strike,  he  beheaded  him.  "  They  say 
that  his  body  stood  erect  for  almost  an  hour.  The  ex- 
ecutioner, seeing  that  it  did  not  fall,  kicked  it  with  his 
foot ;  but  soon  after,  seized  by  demons,  he  lost  his  mind, 
and,  struck  by  the  vengeance  of  God,  threw  himself 
into  the  fire,  and  so  died." 

The  chronicle  is  full  of  accounts  of  miracles  wrought 
by  the  power  of  his  dead  body.  For  these  we  have  no 
room  here.  We  have  quoted  enough  from  it  to  show 
how  little  of  the  spirit  of  Christianity  or  of  faith  was  in 
the  nominal  Christianity  of  those  times.  The  conver- 
sion of  the  barbarians  to  Christianity  was  accompanied 
with  a  conversion  of  Christians  to  barbarism.  The 
Church  eagerly  baptized  all  whom  it  could  persuade  to 
accept  baptism.  It  accommodated  its  teachings  to  them, 
as  meanly  as  it  had  done  to  the  Roman  Emperors. 
Next,  it  received  among  its  teachers  those  who  had  thus 
been  admitted  into  its  number.  So  that  with  every  gen- 
12* 


138  ALFRED.  [a.  D.  849-900. 

eration,  for  a  long  time,  the  evil  grew,  to  appearance, 
rather  than  diminished.  Although  there  were  ways  in 
which  Christ's  true  kingdom  was  advancing,  yet,  in  the 
external  history  of  the  nations  of  the  earth,  it  seemed 
everywhere  to  be  losing  its  true  ground. 

NOTES    TO    CHAPTER   XI. 

There  are  two  lives  of  St.  Leger  in  French,  besides  abridgments 
in  all  Lives  of  the  Saints :  — 

Ursin's,  in  the  Recueil  des  Historiens  de  France; 

Fi-edegaire's,  in  Guizot's  Collection  of  Memoires  relatifs  k  I'His- 
toire  de  France. 

Consult  — 

Sismondi's  History  of  France. 

Stephen's  Lectures  on  French  History.  New  York:  Harper  & 
Brothers.     1851.     1  vol.     8vo.    pp.  710. 

Michelet's  History  of  France,  translated  by  Smith.  Apple- 
ton  &  Co.     1846-47.    2  vols.     Svo. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

fj/f  ALFRED.  S^^f> 

Our  Christianity  came  from  England.  The  Chris- 
tianity and  civilization  of  England  is  a  fruit  which  was 
ripened  by  many  different  storms,  rays  of  sunshine,  and 
clouds  of  dew.  It  is  to  be  ascribed  to  no  one  single 
man  or  event,  but  to  a  combination  of  causes,  uniting 
as  God  only  knows  how  to  unite  causes  to  produce  so 
great  a  result.  In  the  time  of  King  Alfred,  —  who  de- 
serves the  title  of  Alfred  the  Great,  —  we  can  observe 


A.  D.  849-900.]  NATIVE    BRITONS.  139 

most  of  these  causes,  noticing  some  just  in  the  end,  and 
some  just  in  the  beginning,  of  their  influence. 

The  island  of  Great  Britain,  small  as  it  is,  had  then 
been  long  divided  into  many  different  kingdoms.  At 
the  north  there  were  different  Scotch  clans  and  tribes, 
of  which  we  know  little.  England  itself,  till  a  {ew 
years  before  Alfred,  had  been  divided  into  seven  or 
eight  kingdoms,  of  which  the  names  of  some  are 
now  retained  as  counties.  These  were  known  as  the 
Heptarchy,  or  Octarchy,  that  is,  the  Seven  Kingdoms, 
or  Eight  Kingdoms.  The  condition  of  England  dif- 
fered from  that  which  we  have  seen  in  the  time  of  the 
Franks  in  France.  The  Romans  had  left  the  island 
for  four  hundred  years.  There  never  had  been  so 
many  towns  established  by  them,  or  other  results  of 
their  power,  as  in  Gaul.  The  country  was  much  more 
thinly  inhabited,  and  from  the  want  of  Roman  influence 
it  was  much  less  civilized  than  was  Gaul.  Its  native 
inhabitants  had  been  conquered  first  by  the  Romans, 
and  afterwards  by  the  Saxons.  In  both  cases,  however, 
they  had  intermarried  with  their  conquerors,  so  that, 
although  they  existed  only  in  the  West  as  a  separate 
race,  yet  the  descendants  of  native  Britons,  especially 
of  British  women  who  had  married  Roman  or  Saxon 
men,  lived  in  the  old  homes  of  their  ancestors.  And 
thus  there  is  old  British  blood  in  our  veins. 

Claudia,  whom  St.  Paul  alludes  to,*  is  said  to  have 
been  a  British  lady.  If  so,  there  was  at  least  one 
Christian  belonging  to  this  island  in  his  day.      It  has 

*  2  Tim.  iv.  24. 


140  ALFRED.  [a.  D.  849-900. 

been  supposed  that  he  travelled  to  Britain.  We  have 
already  seen  Constantine  made  a  "  Csesar "  while  in 
Britain.  In  the  Roman  armies  at  that  time,  and  among 
the  large  numbers  of  persons  who  in  the  neighborhood 
of  Roman  ports  established  towns  and  villages,  were 
Christians  enough  to  introduce  our  faith  among  the  na- 
tives of  the  island.  It  will  be  remembered  that  the 
great  Pelagius  was  a  Briton.  So  the  native  Britons  had 
Christian  churches  and  teachers  among  them,  when 
they  were  defeated  and  driven  back  into  the  mountains 
of  their  island  by  the  Saxons,  who  were  still  pagans. 

When  defeated,  however,  they  left  Christian  women, 
as  we  have  said,  who  were  wives  of  their  conquerors, 
and  in  their  mountain  refuges  they  retained  themselves 
something  of  their  own  faith,  and  kept  up  their  churches 
and  their  customs  of  Christian  worship.  And  in  the 
time  when  St.  Leger  and  the  various  rivals  in  France 
were  all  fighting  together,  a  distinguished  Benedictine 
Monk,  named  Austin,  or  Augustine,  was  sent  by  the 
Pope  into  England  to  attempt  the  conversion  of  the 
pagan  Saxons.  He  found  so  much  assistance  from  the 
remnants  of  Christianity  there,  and  labored  with  so 
much  piety  and  zeal,  that  his  efforts  and  those  of  his 
successors  brought  the  Saxon  kings  also  into  nominal 
allegiance  to  the  cross. 

When  Alfred  was  born,  his  father,  Ethelwulf,  under 
the  title  of  King  of  the  West  Saxons,  reigned  over  most 
of  the  Saxons  in  England.  But  the  island  suffered 
from  constant  attacks  by  the  piratical  Northmen,  or 
Danes,  from  the  coasts  of  Norway,  Sweden,  and  Den- 
mark.    These  were  the  Vikings,  or  sea-kings,  some- 


A.  D.  849-900.]       LEARNING    TO    READ.  141 

times  called  Berserkr,  so  often  alluded  to  in  the  litera- 
ture of  the  North  of  Europe.  They  were  pagans,  and 
the  people  of  England,  unskilled  in  war  in  comparison 
with  them,  looked  upon  them  with  all  the  more  horror 
upon  account  of  their  irreligion.  They  did  not  disturb 
the  kingdom  so  much,  however,  but  that  Alfred,  while 
yet  a  boy,  made  two  journeys  to  Rome,  in  one  of  which 
the  Pope  is  said  to  have  blessed  him,  anointing  him  as 
the  future  King  of  the  West  Saxons. 

So  illiterate  was  England  then,  that  the  young  prince 
grew  to  be  twelve  years  old  before  he  had  learned  his 
letters.  Many  British  princes  of  his  day  never  learned 
them  at  all.  Happily  for  him,  his  step-mother  Judith, 
who  was  the  daughter  of  a  French  king,  had  more 
taste  for  literature  than  most  of  those  around  her.  And 
one  day,  when  her  boys  were  standing  by  her,  she 
showed  them  a  Saxon  book  of  poetry,  and  said, 
"  Whichsoever  of  you  shall  soonest  learn  this  volume, 
shall  have  it  for  his  own."  "  Stimulated  by  these 
words,"  says  Alfred's  biographer,  "  or  rather  by  the 
Divine  inspiration,  and  allured  by  the  beautifully  il- 
luminated letter  at  the  beginning  of  the  volume,  he 
spoke  before  all  his  brothers,  who,  though  his  seniors  in 
age,  were  not  so  in  grace,  and  answered,  '  Will  you 
really  give  that  book  to  one  of  us,  that  is  to  say,  to 
him  who  can  first  understand  and  repeat  it  to  you  ?  ' 
At  this  his  mother  smiled  with  satisfaction,  and  con- 
firmed what  she  had  before  said.  Upon  which  the  boy 
took  the  book  out  of  her  hand,  and  went  to  his  master 
to  read  it,  and  in  due  time  brought  it  to  his  mother  and 
recited  it."  But  for  this  enticement,  it  would  seem  that 
he  would  not  have  learned  to  read. 


142  ALFRED.  [a.  d.  849  -  900. 

This  early  taste  for  learning  never  left  him.  After- 
wards he  became  king,  first  of  his  father's  kingdom, 
and  eventually  of  all  the  Anglo-Saxons,  or,  as  we  should 
now  say,  of  all  England.  The  Northmen,  pouncing 
down  upon  the  coast  with  their  terrible  black  ships,  dis- 
tressed greatly  one  and  another  part  of  his  kingdom, 
and  finally  all  parts  of  it.  Alfred  had  to  show  other 
kingly  qualhies  than  those  of  a  good  reader,  in  gather- 
ing his  dispirited  subjects  against  such  attacks  of  such 
enemies.  At  one  time,  his  people,  wholly  discouraged 
by  new  visitations  of  swarms  of  Northmen,  just  when 
their  utmost  efforts  had  conquered  those  before  there, 
abandoned  the  war  and  him.  It  was  then  that  Alfred 
wandered,  deserted,  in  his  own  land.  But  new  cruelties 
roused  his  noblemen  again.  Again  the  people  took  up 
arms  at  his  call.  And  his  reign  of  twenty-nine  years, 
crowded  with  wars  against  one  and  another  swarm  of 
these  pirates,  ended  when  he  had  completely  subjugated 
them,  and  was  undisputed  king  of  the  whole  of  Eng- 
land. The  following  account  of  his  first  success  after 
his  worst  misfortune  is  by  Asser,  his  friend,  from  whom 
we  quoted  before.  .It  will  show  the  enthusiasm  which 
surrounded  Alfred,  and  be  also  another  illustration  of 
the  conversions  to  Christianity  of  those  times. 

"  Here  he  was  met  by  all  the  neighboring  folk,  who 
had  not,  for  fear  of  the  pagans,  fled  beyond  the  sea  ; 
and  when  they  saw  the  king  alive,  after  such  great  tribu- 
lation, they  received  him,  as  he  deserved,  with  joy 
and  acclamations,  and  encamped  there  for  one  night. 
When  the  following  day  dawned,  the  king  struck  his 
camp,  and  went  to  Okely,  where  he  encamped  for  one 


A.  D.  849  -  900.]   A  ROYAL  BAPTISM.  143 

night.  The  next  morning  he  removed  to  Edington,  and 
there  fought  bravely  and  perseveringly  against  all  the 
army  of  pagans,  whom,  with  the  Divine  help,  he  de- 
feated with  great  slaughter,  and  pursued  them  flying  to 
their  fortification.  Immediately  he  slew  all  the  men, 
and  carried  off  all  the  booty  that  he  could  find  without 
the  fortress,  which  he  immediately  laid  siege  to  with  all 
his  army ;  and  when  he  had  been  there  fourteen  days, 
the  pagans,  driven  by  famine,  cold,  fear,  and  last  of  all 
by  despair,  asked  for  peace,  on  the  condition  that  they 
should  give  the  king  as  many  hostages  as  he  pleased, 
but  should  receive  none  of  him  in  return,  in  which  form 
they  had  never  before  made  a  treaty  with  any  one. 
The  king,  hearing  that,  took  pity  upon  them,  and  re- 
ceived such  hostages  as  he  chose  ;  after  which  the  pa- 
gans swore,  moreover,  that  they  would  immediately 
leave  the  kingdom  ;  and  their  king,  Gothrun,  promised 
to  embrace  Christianity,  and  receive  baptism  at  King 
Alfred's  hands.  All  of  which  articles  he  and  his  men 
fulfilled  as  they  had  promised.  For  after  seven  weeks 
Gothrun,  king  of  the  pagans,  with  thirty  men  chosen 
from  the  army,  came  to  Alfred  at  a  place  called  Aller, 
near  Athelney,  and  there  King  Alfred,  receiving  him 
as  his  son  by  adoption,  raised  him  from  the  holy  laver 
of  baptism  on  the  eighth  day,  at  a  royal  villa  named 
Wedmore,  where  the  holy  chrism  was  poured  upon 
him.  After  his  baptism  he  remained  twelve  nights 
with  the  king,  who,  with  all  his  nobles,  gave  him  many 
fine  houses." 

When  his  success  in  arms  gave  some  rest  to  his  na- 
tion, Alfred  turned  with  all  his  early  zeal  to  his  books. 


144  ALFRED.  [a.  d.  849  -  900. 

He  even  made  his  old  soldiers,  the  noblemen  of  his 
kingdom,  learn  to  read.  They  would  much  rather 
fight  the  Danes.  But  Alfred  said  to  some  of  them  who 
had  been  undertaking  to  administer  justice  :  "  I  wonder 
truly  at  your  insolence,  that  whereas,  by  God's  favor 
and  mine,  you  have  occupied  the  rank  and  office  of  the 
wise,  you  have  neglected  the  studies  and  labors  of  the 
wise.  Either,  therefore,  at  once  give  up  the  discharge 
of  the  temporal  duties  which  you  hold,  or  endeavor 
more  zealously  to  study  the  lessons  of  wisdom."  The 
poor  earls  trembled.  But  they  could  not  bear  to  give 
up  their  offices,  so  they  set  themselves  to  learning  to 
read  as  fast  and  as  well  as  they  could  ;  and  if  any  of 
them,  it  is  said,  from  old  age  or  slowness  of  talent,  wcs 
unable  to  make  progress  in  study,  he  commanded  some 
son  or  kinsman  or  servant  to  read  to  him  night  and  day 
when  he  had  any  leisure,  "  And  they  lamented  with 
deep  sighs,  in  their  inmost  hearts,  that  in  their  youth 
they  had  never  attended  to  such  studies." 

Alfred's  own  studies  were  respectable.  He  devoted 
half  his  time,  as  well  as  much  of  his  revenue,  to  the  ser- 
vice of  God  ;  and  of  this  time  much  was  occupied  in 
translating  into  the  Anglo-Saxon  tongue  such  parts  of 
old  authors  as  he  thought  would  be  a  benefit  to  his  peo- 
ple. But  he  gave  them  greater  gifts  than  a  sudden 
impulse  in  learning  ;  from  which,  indeed,  they  fell  back 
after  his  death.  He  arranged  the  institutions  of  domes- 
tic government,  and  so  carefully  carried  them  out,  that 
he  used  to  hang  up  and  leave  golden  bracelets  at  the 
corners  of  the  highways,  certain  that  they  would  not  be 
stolen,  and  as  an  evidence  to  all  travellers  of  the  safety 


A.  D.  849 -900.]  HIS    PEOPLE.  145 

of  property  in  his  dominions.  He  was  indeed  a  Chris- 
tian king.  He  believed  in  the  superstitions  of  his 
times,  for  he  was  the  man  of  his  times.  But  with  the 
best  light  he  had  he  worshipped  God,  advanced  his 
kingdom,  and  obeyed  the  Saviour  in  whom  he  trusted. 

He  found  an  uncultivated  island,  inhabited  by  a 
frightened,  ignorant  peasantry,  ravaged  by  pagan  tribes ; 
really  without  government,  and  without  hope  of  im- 
provement. He  left  it  a  united  nation ;  its  enemies 
respecting  it,  and  a  part  of  them,  in  name,  converted  to 
its  faith.  He  left  his  people  ignorant,  but  he  left  the 
foundation  of  institutions  which  should  improve  them. 
He  left  them  barbarous,  but  he  had  established  those 
systems  of  home  government,  of  village  administration, 
under  which,  as  it  has  proved,  there  have  sprung  from 
them  the  most  enlightened  nations  of  the  world.  It 
cannot  be  said,  that,  in  the  highest  sense  of  the  word§, 
his  was  a  Christian  nation.  The  peasantry  and  priests 
were  alike  superstitious,  and  not  only  held  to  pagan 
traditions,  but  did  not  conform  their  lives  to  the  Chris- 
tian spirit  in  thought  or  in  action.  Most  of  them  were 
Christians  in  form  more  than  at  heart.  But  there  was 
planted  among  them  then  that  love  of  the  truth,  and  in 
the  nation's  heart  there  was  that  uneasiness  under  con- 
trol, which  has  made  them  and  theirs  to  be  Protestants 
and  free  inquirers. 

And  the  Christianity  of  Protestants  and  free  inquirers 
is  always  growing  more  and  more  pure. 

To  produce  such  a  state  of  things  there  have  united 
in  England, — 

1.  The  old  Roman  influence,  which  is  still  seen  in 

NO.  VIII.  13 


]46  ^        ALFRED.  [a.  D.  849 -900. 

some  features  of  our  law  and  municipal  government, 
and  which  in  Alfred's  time  could  be  distinctly  traced, 
even  in  Roman  forts  and  roads  and  cities. 

2.  The  early  Christian  influence,  which  affected  even 
the  Saxons  when  they  conquered  Britain. 

3.  The  energetic  element  of  the  Saxon  character,  of 
which  Alfred  himself  is  a  fine  example. 

4.  The  dashing,  adventurous  spirit  of  the  Northmen. 
Afterwards,  when  more  civilized,  their  kings  became 
kings  of  England,  and  their  noblemen  her  nobles.  In 
the  enterprise  of  the  Danes  and  Northmen,  in  their  pas- 
sion for  the  sea,  in  their  recklessness  of  pure  sentiment 
or  high  beauty  until  Christianity  gives  it  to  them,  are 
elements  of  character  easily  found  in  the  Englishman 
or  New-Englander  of  to-day. 

5.  The  deep  Christian  spirit  of  Alfred,  and  his  best 
advisers,  who  sought  from  on  high,  in  the  darkness 
around  them,  the  best  light  which  there  was  for  their 
time.     This  is  the  true  spirit  of  the  true  Protestant. 


NOTES    TO    CHAPTEE    XII. 

In  Miss  Bremer's  tales  are  constant  allusions  to  Danish  or 
Northern  mythology. 

Frithiofs  Saga,  the  great  poem  of  Bishop  Tegner,  is  a  beautiful 
illustration  of  it.  The  best  translation  is  one  by  three  Swedish  la- 
dies, published  at  London. 

Mallet's  Northern  Antiquities  is  well  edited  in  Bohn's  Antiqua- 
rian Library.  The  first  four  A'olumes  of  this  admirable  series  con- 
tain, also,  Bede's  Ecclesiastical  History,  AVilliam  of  Malmesbury's 
Chronicle,  six  other  old  English  Chronicles,  and  the  "Anglo- 
Saxon  Chronicle,"  which  cover  very  fully  the  early  English  his- 


A.  D.  1013  -  1085.]    HILDEBRAND.  147 

tory ;  and,  like  almost  all  originals,  are  far  more  entertaining  than 
any  "made-over"  abridgments. 

Bulwer's  beautiful  poem,  "  King  Arthur,"  contains  a  pleasing 
picture  of  the  introduction  of  Christianity  among  the  Saxons. 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

HILDEBRAND,  OR    POPE    GREGORY   THE    SEVENTH. CATH- 
OLIC   SUPREMACY. 

About  a  hundred  years  after  Alfred's  death,  in  the 
year  1013,  there  was  born  in  Tuscany  a  carpenter's 
son,  who  before  his  death  gained  more  immediate 
power  over  the  world  than  ever  King  Alfred  had,  and 
who  left  a  system,  built  up  by  himself,  which  rules  in 
the  world,  although  with  a  power  constantly  diminish- 
ing, to  this  day.  His  name  was  Hildebrand.  His  father 
saw  that  he  was  a  bright  boy,  and  gave  him  a  literary 
education.  One  of  his  teachers  was  John  Gratian,  af- 
terwards Pope  Gregory  the  Sixth.  When  the  boy  had 
grown  old  enough,  he  became  a  priest,  and  entered  the 
convent  of  Cluny,  in  the  South  of  France. 

He  was  prior  of  this  convent,  and  much  respected  by 
the  brethren  and  by  all  who  knew  him,  when,  in  the 
thirty-sixth  year  of  his  age,  Bishop  Bruno,  who  had  just 
been  appointed  Pope,  passed  through  Cluny,  on  his  way 
to  Rome  to  assume  his  office.  The  custom  then  was, 
that,  on  the  death  of  a  Pope,  the  Emperor  of  Germany 
should  appoint  his  successor ;  and  accordingly  the  Em- 
peror Henry  had  appointed  Bruno.     Bruno  had  accept- 


148  HILDEBRAND.       [a.  D.  1013- 1085. 

ed  the  appointment,  and  arrived  at  Cluny,  on  this  occa- 
sion, on  Christmas  day,  dressed  in  the  garb  of  Pope, 
in  great  splendor,  and  with  a  rejoicing  attendance.  At 
Cluny  the  imposing  train  stopped  to  spend  the  Christmas 
holidays. 

While  the  new  Pope,  who  as  Pope  took  the  title  of 
Leo  the  Ninth,  was  here,  he  and  Hildebrand  and  the 
abbot  seem  to  have  discussed  very  earnestly  the  position 
of  Rome,  of  Christianity,  and  of  Europe.  Hildebrand 
was  very  sure,  that,  in  the  condition  of  the  times,  it  was 
quite  possible  that  the  Pope  might  make  claims  as  the 
head  of  the  Church  which  had  never  been  made  sys- 
tematically before,  —  and  might  sustain  them,  by  play- 
ing one  power  in  Europe  against  another.  He  looked 
forward  to  the  time  when  the  Pope  should  crown  or  dis- 
crown, at  his  pleasure,  every  king  in  Christendom.  He 
felt  that  in  that  day,  when,  by  such  jars  and  wars  as  we 
have  seen  in  Alfred's  time  and  in  Leger's  time,  all 
kings  were  weakened  to  the  last  degree,  and  jealous  of 
each  other,  there  was  the  best  chance  for  this  bold  claim 
on  the  part  of  the  Popes.  But  for  this  the  Pope  must 
himself  be  independent  of  any  sovereign.  One  who 
was  to  make  kings  and  emperors  must  not  own  that  he 
could  himself  be  made  by  a  Gernian  Emperor.  And 
therefore,  when  Bruno,  after  the  Christmas  festival,  left 
Cluny  for  Rome,  at  Hildebrand's  earnest  advice  he  went 
not  as  Pope,  in  the  dress  of  a  Pope,  but  in  the  sober 
dress  of  a  pilgrim,  holding  a  pilgrim's  staff.  It  was  not 
Leo  the  Ninth,  the  Pope  who  had  entered  the  convent, 
who  left  it.  It  was  simple  Bruno,  the  bishop  of  Toul 
Hildebrand  accompanied  him.    Through  crowds  of  peo- 


A.  D.  1013-1085.]  SIMONY.  149 

pie,  who  had  assembled  to  see  the  pomp  of  the  proces- 
sion, there  moved  along  only  this  humble  pilgrim  com- 
pany. For  the  Bishop  announced  that  he  should  not  re- 
gard himself  as  Pope,  till  the  Roman  clergy  and  people 
had  confirmed  the  nomination  which  the  Emperor  had 
made.  Barefooted,  with  his  train,  he  entered  Rome,  and 
asked  this  confirmation.  The  Roman  clergy  and  people 
of  course  gave  it  eagerly.  And  the  new  Pope,  having 
thus  an  appearance  of  authority  which  the  Emperor 
alone  could  not  give,  was  able  to  proceed  more  boldly 
in  the  various  measures  which  he  pursued. 

Leo  reigned  as  Pope  but  five  years,  nor  did  any  of 
his  immediate  successors  hold  his  seat  long.  But,  dur- 
ing all  their  reigns,  Hildebrand,  under  the  names  of 
Subdeacon  and  Chancellor,  was  the  real  mover  in  their 
plans. 

He  knew  that  such  empire  as  he  sought  for  the 
Church  of  Rome  was  impossible  while  the  clergy  con- 
tinued as  ignorant  and  licentious  as  they  then  were.  He 
set  his  face  against  the  custom  of  marriage  in  the  clergy, 
which  was  then  as  general  among  Catholics,  perhaps,  as 
it  is  now  among  Protestants.  Especially  was  he  indig- 
nant at  the  custom,  very  prevalent  in  the  Church,  by 
which  men  bought  with  money  spiritual  offices.  This 
custom  is  known  as  simony^  in  reference  to  the  propo- 
sal of  this  sort  which  Simon  the  magician  made  to  St. 
Peter.*  Hildebrand  held  councils  which  declared  the 
sin  of  this  course,  and  other  councils  which  tried  those 
who  wei-e  guilty  of  it.    Such  investigations  excited  great 

*  Acts  viii.  18-24. 
13* 


150  HILDEBRAND.        [a.  D.  1013  -  1085. 

dismay  among  the  clergy.  But  he  carried  them  on 
with  a  relentless  hand.  The  following  account  of  one 
of  them  is  very  probably  true.  At  all  events  it  was 
believed  universally  at  the  time,  and  had  the  same  ef- 
fect as  if  true. 

A  French  archbishop  was  charged  with  having  bought 
his  office.  He  was  summoned  for  trial,  and  Hildebrand 
himself  sat  as  judge,  representing  the  Pope.  But  the 
archbishop  had  taken  care  of  the  result,  by  bribing  those 
who  had  informed  against  him  to  keep  silent.  When 
the  assembly  opened,  he  stepped  boldly  forward,  and 
said,  "  Where  are  they  who  charge  me  ?  Let  my  ac- 
cuser step  forth."  There  was  silence,  and,  as  he  in- 
tended, no  one  appeared.  If,  however,  he  triumphed  in 
this  success,  his  triumph  was  a  short  one.  Hildebrand 
himself  spoke.  "Dost  thou  believe,"  said  he,  "that 
the  Holy  Ghost  with  Father  and  Son  are  one  Being." 
"  I  believe  it,"  replied  he.  Then  Hildebrand  bade  him 
repeat,  "  Glory  to  the  Father,  and  to  the  Son,  and  to  the 
Holy  Ghost."  And  the  archbishop  began  the  familiar 
formula.  But  Hildebrand's  eye  was  on  him,  and  it 
quickened  his  conscience  as  such  a  piercing  eye  can  ; 
so  that,  when  the  proud  archbishop  came  to  the  words 
"  the  Holy  Ghost,"  his  voice  failed  him.  He  remem- 
bered, probably,  what  Christ  said  of  blasphemy  against 
the  Holy  Ghost,  and  had  the  mistaken  feeling  that  he 
could  blaspheme  it  more  completely  than  in  his  lie  he 
had  already  done.  Again  and  again  he  tried  to  speak 
them,  but  failed.  All  present  regarded  this  as  a  divine 
judgment.  He  did.  He  fell  at  Hildebrand's  feet,  and 
confessed  himself  unworthy  of  the  priest's  office.    After 


A.  D.  1013- 1085.]       THE    TWO    LIGHTS.  151 


this  confession,  he  could  speak  the  words  on  which  he 
had  failed  before.  The  fame  of  the  incident  induced 
twenty-seven  other  churchmen,  and  several  bishops,  to 
lay  down  their  offices,  before  they  were  accused  of  si- 
mony, because,  in  fact,  they  were  guilty. 

For  twenty-four  years,  Hildebrand  held  the  real 
power  of  the  Popes,  under  the  name  of  Chancellor. 
After  several  short  reigns  he  was  himself  appointed 
Pope,  by  the  tumultuous  nomination  of  the  Roman  peo- 
ple. He  took  the  Papal  name  of  Gregory  the  Seventh. 
All  this  time  he  had  been  strengthening  the  power  of 
the  Popedom.  A  generation  of  priests  had  grown  up, 
used  to  his  restrictions.  Wherever  he  had  had  a  chance 
to  interfere  in  the  political  struggles  of  the  nations,  he 
had  done  so.  Of  course  one  side  was  always  glad  of 
his  interference,  and  neutral  powers  had  no  occasion, 
as  they  thought,  to  take  notice  of  it.  More  and  more 
boldly  did  he  make  his  declarations  of  his  power.  In 
one  of  his  letters  he  says :  "  The  world,  then,  is  guided 
by  two  lights  :  by  the  sun,  the  larger,  and  the  moon, 
the  lesser  light.  Thus  the  apostolic  power  represents 
the  sun,  and  the  royal  power  the  moon  ;  for  as  the  latter 
has  its  light  from  the  former,  so  only  do  emperors, 
kings,  and  princes  receive  their  authority  through  the 
Pope,  because  he  receives  his  authority  through  God. 
Therefore  the  power  of  the  Roman  chair  is  greater 
than  the  power  of  the  throne,  and  the  king  is  accord- 
ingly subject  to  the  Pope,  and  bound  in  obedience  to 
him.  If  the  Apostles  in  heaven  can  bind  and  loosen,  so 
may  they  also  upon  earth  give  and  take,  according  to 
merit,  empires,  kingdoms,  principalities,  duchies,  and 


152  HILDEBRAND.       [a.  D.  1013 -1085. 

every  other  kind  of  possession.  Besides,  the  Pope  is 
the  successor  to  the  Apostles,  and  their  representative 
upon  the  chair  of  St.  Peter ;  he  is  the  vicar  of  Christ, 
and  consequently  placed  over  all." 

Such  claims  made  no  great  commotion,  as  long  as 
they  did  not  interfere  with  any  of  the  stronger  powers. 
But  when,  on  one  occasion,  he  had  threatened  to  excom- 
municate the  Emperor  Henry,  from  whose  ancestors 
his  predecessors  had  received  their  appointment,  and 
whom  he  had  permitted  to  confirm  his  own,  the  Em- 
peror answered  by  anathematizing  him,  in  a  council  of 
his  own,  and  wrote  to  him  in  these  words  :  — 

"  Henry,  king,  not  by  force,  but  by  the  sacred  ordi- 
nation of  God,  to  Hildebrand,  —  not  the  Pope,  but  the 
false  monk  :  This  greeting  hast  thou  merited  by  the 
confusion  thou  hast  spread  throughout  all  classes  of  the 
Church.  Thou  hast  trampled  under  thy  feet  ministers 
of  the  holy  Church,  as  slaves  who  know  not  what  their 
lord  does  ;  and  by  that  desecration  hast  thou  won  favor 
from  the  lips  of  the  common  herd  of  people.  We  have 
long  suffered  this,  because  we  were  desirous  to  maintain 
the  honor  of  the  Roman  chair.  But  thou  hast  mistaken 
our  forbearance  for  fear,  and  hast  become  em.boldcned 
to  raise  thyself  above  the  royal  power,  bestowed  upon 
us  by  God  himself,  and  threatened  to  take  it  from  us, 
as  if  we  had  received  our  dominion  from  thee.  De- 
scend, therefore,  thou  that  liest  under  a  curse  of  excom- 
munication by  our  and  all  bishops'  judgment,  descend  ! 
Quit  the  apostolic  seat  thou  hast  usurped  !  And  then 
shall  the  chair  of  St.  Peter  be  ascended  by  one  who 
does  not  conceal,  under  the  divine  word,  his  arrogance. 


A.  D.  1018-1085.]    THE  EBIPRESS  COASTING.  153 

I,  Henry,  by  God's  grace  king,  and  all  our  bishops,  say 
to  thee,  '  Descend !  Descend  ! '  " 

Upon  this,  the  Pope  held  a  council  also,  and  not  only 
pronounced  the  sentence  of  excommunication  against 
Henry,  but  deposed  him  in  the  following  words  :  —  "In 
the  name  of  the  Almighty  God,  I  forbid  to  King  Henry, 
the  son  of  the  Emperor  Henry,  who  with  haughtiness 
unheard  of  has  arisen  against  the  Church,  the  govern- 
ment of  the  German  and  Italian  Empire,  and  absolve 
all  Christians  from  the  oath  which  they  have  made  or 
will  make  to  him,  and  forbid  that  any  one  serve  him  as 
king.  And,  occupying  thy  office,  holy  Peter,  I  bind 
him  with  the  bands  of  a  curse,  that  all  nations  may 
learn  that  thou  art  Peter,  and  upon  this  rock  the  Son  of 
the  living  God  has  built  his  Church,  and  that  the  gates 
of  hell  shall  not  prevail  against  it." 

He  followed  up  this  excommunication  with  the  ex- 
communication of  a  list,  almost  countless,  of  priests  and 
noblemen  who  followed  Henry.  And  so  began  the  real 
struggle  for  the  claim  he  had  so  long  made  for  the  Pa- 
pal power. 

Henry  at  first  ridiculed  the  excommunication.  But 
the  politics  of  his  own  empire  were  involved,  and  every 
sort  of  rebel  was  glad  to  make  use  of  the  Pope's  author- 
ity. Henry  was  frightened  at  finding  himself  deserted 
by  almost  all  his  followers.  With  his  wife  and  one 
companion  only,  he  started  in  the  depth  of  winter  to 
make  his  submission  to  the  Pope.  The  winter  was 
more  severe  than  ever.  As  they  crossed  Mount  Cenis, 
the  poor  Empress  was  wrapped  in  an  ox-hide,  and 
coasted  down  the  steep  roads,  under  the  care   of  her 


154  HILDEBRAND.       [a.  D.  1013- 1085. 

Matilda  of  Canossa.  She  solicited  the  Pope  to  make 
terms  with  him.  He,  however,  at  first  "  would  by  no 
mfeans  hear  of  a  reconciliation,  but  referred  all  to  the 
decision  of  the  Diet ;  at  last,  however,  upon  much  en- 
treaty, he  yielded  permission  that  Henry,  in  the  garb  of 
a  penitent,  covered  with  a  shirt  of  hair,  and  with  naked 
feet,  might  be  received  in  the  castle.  As  the  Emperor 
advanced  within  the  outer  gate,  it  was  immediately 
closed,  so  that  the  escort  which  had  joined  him  in  Sa- 
voy was  obliged  to  remain  outside  of  the  fortress,  and 
he  himself  was  now  alone  in  the  outer  court.  Here,  in 
January,  in  the  midst  of  a  severe  and  rigorous  winter, 
he  was  obliged  to  remain  three  whole  days  barefooted 
and  shivering  with  the  cold.  All  in  the  castle  were 
moved.  Gregory  himself  writes  in  a  letter,  '  that  every 
one  present  had  severely  censured  him,  and  said  that 
his  conduct  more  resembled  tyrannical  ferocity  than 
apostolic  severity.'  The  Countess  Matilda,  while  vainly 
pleading  for  him,  was  affected  even  to  burning  tears  of 
pity  and  grief,  and  Henry,  in  his  distress,  at  length  only 
prayed  that  he  might  at  least  be  allowed  to  go  out  again. 
On  the  fourth  of  these  dreadful  days,  the  Pope  event- 
ually admitted  him  before  him,  and  absolved  him  from 
excommunication  ;  but  Herry  was  still  forced  to  sub- 
scribe to  the  most  severe  conditions.  He  was  obliged 
to  promise  to  present  himself  at  the  day  and  place  the 
Pope  should  appoint,  in  order  to  hear  whether  he  might 
remain  king  or  not,  and  meanwhile  he  was  to  abstain 
from  all  exercise  of  the  royal  attributes  and  monarchal 
power."  * 

*  Kohlrausch'R  Germany^ 


A.  D.  1013- 1085.]  POWER  OF  THE  POPE.  155 

This  was,  perhaps,  the  greatest  triumph  which  Pope 
Gregory  ever  had.  Henry  rallied  from  his  alarm,  made 
war  against  him  again,  took  Rome,  and  besieged  the 
Pope  in  his  citadel  of  St.  Angelo.  And  before  his 
death,  the  poor  old  Pope  was  himself  driven  to  Salerno, 
where  he  died.  On  his  death-bed,  he  said,  "I  have 
loved  justice,  and  hated  evil,  and  therefore  I  die  in  ex- 
ile." The  bishop  in  attendance  heard  the  words,  and 
replied,  "  No,  Holy  Father,  you  cannot  die  in  exile  ;  for 
God  has  given  you  all  nations  for  a  heritage  and  the 
ends  of  the  earth  for  a  dominion."  So  far  had  Gregory 
given  his  own  spirit  to  his  clergy. 

-For  more  than  two  hundred  years,  the  impulse  which 
this  remarkable  man  gave  to  the  Roman  power  held 
its  sway  unabated.  The  Popes  took  new  rights  con- 
stantly in  the  kingdoms  of  Europe.  They  could  ab- 
solve a  king  from  his  oath  ;  or  they  held  him  to  their 
interpretation  of  it.  They  dissolved  his  marriage  con- 
tract, or  insisted  upon  it.  All  cases  of  controversy 
were  brought  by  appeal  before  them,  on  the  ground  that 
they  might  judge  if  sin  had  been  committed  in  previous 
decisions,  so  that  they  decided  questions  of  trade,  as 
warranties  and  mortgages.  Such  claims  at  supremacy 
had  been  hinted  at  before.  But  Hildebrand  or  Gregory 
was  the  first  to  make  them  real.  It  was  about  250 
years  after  his  real  reign  began,  that  some  weakness 
began  to  appear  in  the  execution  of  such  claims.  In 
those  two  centuries  and  a  half  the  Papal  power  was  at 
its  height.  Since  then  it  has  been  declining,  till  now 
the  poor  Pius  Ninth  holds  his  throne  merely  by  suffer- 
ance, despised  by  his  own  people,  who  trusted  him  only 


156  THE  CRUSADES,   [a.  D.  1191  -  1194. 

too  far,  and  the  weakest  power  among  the  various  sov- 
ereigns of  Europe.  His  spiritual  sway  is  wide  indeed. 
But  over  crowns  and  sceptres  he  has  as  little  power  as 
had  the  humblest  of  his  early  predecessors. 

NOTES   TO   CHAPTER  XIII. 

In  J.  H.  Perkins's  Writings  (2  vols.,  Crosby  &  Nichols,  1851) 
there  is  a  valuable  article  on  Hildebrand,  reprinted  from  the  N.  A. 
Review  of  July,  184.5. 

Kohlrausch's  History  of  Germany,  translated  by  Haas  (Appleton 
&  Co.,  1845),  is  a  good  book  of  reference  for  the  history  on  which 
this  chapter  only  enters. 

Hallam's  Middle  Ages  may  seem  formidable  to  young  readers; 
but  they  can  understand  it,  and  will  certainly  profit  by  it. 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

THE    CRUSADES.  —  RICJIARD    OF    ENGLAND. 

The  history  of  the  Crusades  is  itself  a  subject  far  too 
large  to  be  attempted  in  a  chapter  of  this  volume.  And 
it  is  so  often  treated,  and  by  such  attractive  authors,  that 
every  one  who  will  read  this  book  will  have  gained  in 
other  quarters  such  information  with  regard  to  these 
great  expeditions  as  is  necessary  to  our  present  view  of 
them. 

It  is  very  evident  that  in  the  end  they  greatly  im- 
proved the  civilization  of  Europe,  and  so  of  the  world. 
To  say  this,  is  simply  to  say  again  that  God  rules  the 
world.     The  Crusades  happened,  as  he  permitted.     Of 


A.  D.  1191-1194.]    FALL    OF    JERUSALEM.  157 

course,  therefore,  good  follows  from  them.  This  lesson 
may  be  gained  from  all  history.  But  it  does  not  follow 
that  those  who  entered  upon  them  aimed  at  those  re- 
sults which  have  come.  To  prove  this  would  require 
argument  going  far  deeper  than  that  which  shows  that 
those  results  were  benefits. 

In  fact,  the  Crusades  gave  a  common  cause  of  effort 
to  the  warriors  and  kings  of  Europe  ;  and  this  common 
cause  was  a  religious  cause,  and  it  therefore  brought 
them  sometimes  into  dependence  upon  their  spiritual  sov- 
ereign, the  Pope.  These  were  the  two  features  without 
which  they  would  never  have  existed.  The  Popes  could 
have  crushed  them,  had  they  chose.  They  would  have 
chosen  to  do  so,  if  they  had  not  directly  strengthened 
the  newly  established  Papal  system.  As  they  did 
strengthen  this  system,  the  Popes  favored  them,  seized 
eagerly  on  the  first  suggestion  of  a  Crusade,  fanned 
the  spirit  which  made  them  into  life,  and  kept  it  active 
for  centuries,  till,  in  spite  of  them,  it  died.  Among  the 
plans  of  Hildebrand  was  a  Crusade.  He  felt  that  it 
would  unite  Europe,  and  make  united  Europe  subser- 
vient to  Rome.  He  bided  his  time  for  it.  And  when 
Peter  the  Hermit,  with  whom  Hildebrand  had  consulted, 
returned  from  Jerusalem,  eager  to  excite  again  the 
Christians  of  Europe,  already  incensed  for  centuries 
because  infidels  had  any  hold  of  the  Holy  City,  Pope 
Urban,  Hildebrand's  successor,  made  him  his  instru- 
ment at  once.  He  would  have  silenced  him,  as  he 
silenced  other  fanatics,  but  that  this  excitement  helped 
the  Holy  See. 

Jerusalem  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Christians.    After 

NO.  VIII.  14 


158  THE    CRUSADES.       [a.  D.  1 191  -  1 194. 

nearly  a  century  they  lost  it ;  and  a  new  Crusade  was 
then  undertaken. 

The  real  leader  in  this  was  the  gallant  King  Richard 
the  Lion-hearted.  He  is  a  favorite  hero  in  England, 
and  in  English  literature.  His  deeds  have  often  been 
ftivorably  presented,  with  the  best  ornaments  of  litera- 
ture, under  the  best  arrangements  of  modern  style.  We 
propose,  therefore,  to  bring  together  a  few  anecdotes  of 
his  campaign  in  Palestine,  as  his  own  admirers  in  his 
time  recorded  them,  that,  even  if  in  contrast  to  these 
civilized  pictures,  we  may  make  a  fair  picture  of  what 
the  Crusades  were  to  the  people  of  their  time. 

Richard  landed  with  his  brave  Englishmen  at  Acre. 
The  Crusaders  were  besieging  that  town,  and  he  assist- 
ed in  the  siege.  It  became  closer  and  closer.  The 
petrarise,  or  stone -throwers,  one  of  which  was  named 
God's  petraria,  "  never  ceased  to  shake  the  walls  day 
and  night.  And  when  the  Turks  saw  this,  they  were 
smitten  with  wonder,  astonishment,  terror,  and  confu- 
sion ;  and  many,  yielding  to  their  fears,  threw  them- 
selves down  from  the  walls  by  night ;  and,  without  wait- 
ing for  the  aid  promised  by  Saladin,  very  many  sought 
with  supplications  the  sacrament  of  baptism  and  Chris- 
tianity. There  was  little  doubt,  and  with  good  reason 
as  to  their  merits,  that  they  presumptuously  asked  the 
boon  more  from  the  pressure  of  urgent  fear  than  from 
any  divine  inspiration  ;  but  there  are  different  steps  by 
which  men  arrive  to  salvation." 

Such  is  the  cool  remark  of  a  priest  of  the  time,  writ- 
ing his-  history  in  good  faith.  It  did  not  offend  the 
Christianity  of  his  day.      He  goes  on  to  tell  how  the 


A.  D.  1191-1194.]    THE    HOSTAGES    HUNG.  159 

citizens  capitulated.  They  made  a  treaty,  to  which 
Saladin,  chief  of  the  Saracens,  assented,  and  gave  hos- 
tages for  its  performance.  But  it  was  not  performed. 
And  in  consequence,  "  When  it  became  clearly  evident 
to  King  Richard  that  a  longer  period  had  elapsed  than 
had  been  fixed,  and  that  Saladin  was  obdurate,  and  would 
not  give  himself  trouble  to  ransom  the  hostages,  he 
called  together  a  council  of  the  chiefs  of  the  people,  by 
whom  it  was  resolved  that  the  hostages  should  all  be 
hanged,  except  a  few  nobles  of  the  higher  class,  who 
might  ransom  themselves,  or  be  exchanged  for  some 
Christian  captives.  King  Richard,  aspiring  to  destroy 
the  Turks  root  and  branch,  and  to  punish  their  wanton 
arrogance,  as  well  as  to  abolish  the  law  of  Mahomet 
and  to  vindicate  the  Christian  religion,  on  the  Friday 
after  the  Assumption  of  the  Blessed  Virgin  Mary  or- 
dered two  thousand  seven  hundred  of  the  Turkish  hos- 
tages to  be  led  forth  from  the  city  and  hanged.  His 
soldiers  marched  forward  with  delight  to  fulfil  his  com- 
mands, and  to  retaliate,  with  the  assent  of  the  Divine 
Grace,  by  taking  revenge  upon  those  who  had  destroyed 
so  many  of  the  Christians  with  missiles  from  bows  and 
arbalists." 

With  so  little  grief  were  prisoners  put  to  death, — 
and  with  so  little  Christianity  was  the  conquest  of  the 
Sepulchre  attempted.  Yet  there  was  not  a  want  of  a 
certain  Christian  sentiment  among  the  troops.  They 
marched  from  Acre  inland.  "  When  the  king  had  pro- 
ceeded as  far  as  Capernaum,  which  the  Saracens  had 
razed  to  the  ground,  he  dismounted  and  took  some  food, 
the  army,  meanwhile,  waiting;  those  who  chose  took 


160  THE  CRUSADES,  [a.  D.  1191  -  1194. 

food,  and  immediately  after  proceeded  on  their  march 
to  the  house  called  '  of  the  narrow  way,'  because  the 
road  there  becomes  narrow.  There  they  halted  and 
pitched  their  tents.  It  was  the  custom  of  the  army  each 
night,  before  lying  down  to  rest,  to  depute  some  one  to 
stand  in  the  middle  of  the  camp  and  cry  out  with  a  loud 
voice,  '  Help  !  help  !  for  the  Holy  Sepulchre  ! '  The 
rest  of  the  army  took  it  up,  and  repeated  the  words ; 
and,  stretching  their  hands  to  heaven,  amid  a  profusion 
of  tears,  prayed  for  the  mercy  and  assistance  of  God  in 
the  cause.  Then  the  herald  himself  repeated  the  words 
in  a  loud  voice,  '  Help  !  for  the  Holy  Sepulchre  ! '  and 
p.very  one  repeated  it  after  him  a  second  time,  and  like- 
./ise  a  third  time,  with  contrition  of  heart  and  abundant 
weeping.  For  who  would  not  weep  at  such  a  moment, 
when  the  very  mention  of  its  having  been  done  would 
extract  tears  from  the  auditors.  The  army  appeared  to 
be  much  refreshed  by  crying  out  in  this  fashion." 

With  such  refreshment  they  marched  to  and  fro 
through  Palestine.  They  had  not  force  enough  to  be- 
siege Jerusalem,  but  they  gallantly  met  the  Turks  in 
the  field,  and  the  fighting  really  took  place  which  is  the 
theme  of  so  many  ballads  and  romances.  The  Marquis 
of  Montferrat  is  chosen  king,  and  assassinated,  as  may 
be  read  in  "  The  Talisman."  Count  Henry  of  Cham- 
pagne is  appointed  his  successor.  Meanwhile,  Easter 
passes.  And  on  Easter  eve,  King  Saladin,  of  the 
Saracens,  visits  the  Holy  Sepulchre  "  to  assure  himself 
of  the  truth  of  a  certain  fact,  namely,  the  coming  down 
from  heaven  of  fire,  once  a  year,  to  light  a  lamp. 
After  he  had  watched  for  some  time,  with  great  atten- 


A.  D.  1191-1194.]     THE  EASTER  MIRACLE.  161 

tion,  the  devotion  and  contrition  of  many  Christian  cap- 
tives, who  were  praying  for  the  mercy  of  God,  he  and 
all  the  other  Turks  suddenly  saw  the  divine  fire  descend 
and  light  the  lamp,  so  that  they  were  vehemently  moved, 
while  the  Christians  rejoiced,  and  with  loud  voices 
praised  the  mighty  works  of  God.  But  the  Saracens 
disbelieved  this  manifest  and  wonderful  miracle,  though 
they  witnessed  it  with  their  own  eyes,  and  asserted  that 
it  was  a  fraudulent  contrivance.  To  assure  himself  of 
this,  Saladin  ordered  the  lamp  to  be  extinguished ; 
which,  hovt^ever,  was  instantly  rekindled  by  the  Divine 
power.  And  when  the  infidel  ordered  it  to  be  extin- 
guished a  second  time,  it  was  lighted  a  second  time  ; 
and  so  likewise  a  third  time.  God  is  all-patient.  Of 
what  use  is  it  to  fight  against  the  Invincible  Power  ? 
There  is  no  counsel  against  God,  nor  is  there  any  one 
who  can  resist  his  will.  Saladin,  wondering  at  this 
miraculous  vision,  and  the  faith  and  devotion  of  the 
Christians,  and  exceedingly  moved,  asserted  by  the 
spirit  of  prophecy,  that  he  should  either  die  or  lose 
possession  of  the  city  of  Jerusalem.  And  his  prophecy 
was  fulfilled,  for  he  died  the  Lent  following." 

These  are  the  words  of  the  old  chronicle.  This 
miracle  was  annual,  and  greatly  celebrated  in  those 
times.  It  was  made  to  take  place  every  year  for  some 
centuries.  Nearly  two  hundred  years  before,  the  Kha- 
lif  Hakem,  governor  of  Jerusalem,  was  told,  "  that 
when  the  Christians  assembled  in  their  temple  at  Jeru- 
salem to  celebrate  Easter,  the  chaplains  of  the  Church, 
making  use  of  a  pious  fraud,  greased  the  chain  of  iron 
that  held  the  lamp  over  the  tomb  with  oil   of  balsam ; 


162  THE  CRUSADES.   [a.  D.  1 191  -  1194. 

and  that,  when  the  Arab  officer  had  sealed  up  the  dooi 
which  led  to  the  tomb,  they  applied  a  match,  through 
the  roof,  to  the  other  extremity  of  the  chain,  and  the 
fire  descended  immediately  to  the  wick  of  the  lamp 
and  lighted  it."  He  was  angiy  at  such  a  fraud,  and  a 
persecution  of  the  Christians  followed,  in  which  the 
church  was  destroyed,  in  the  year  1008  or  1010. 

The  Christian  armies  celebrated  Easter  in  camp. 
But  their  dissensions  increased.  Richard  was  sent  for 
from  England,  in  consequence  of  great  troubles  at 
home.  But  the  troops  begged  him  to  remain.  And  he 
promised  to  remain  till  after  another  Easter.  It  was  at 
this  time  that,  "  on  the  third  day  before  the  feast  of  St. 
John  the  Baptist,  i.  e.  St.  Alban's  day,  while  the  army 
was  staying  there,  they  were  much  comforted  by  news 
which  was  brought  to  the  king.  For  a  devout  man,  the 
Abbot  of  St.  Elie,  whose  countenance  bespoke  holiness, 
with  long  beard  and  head  of  snow,  came  to  the  king, 
and  told  him  that  a  long  time  ago  he  had  concealed  a 
piece  of  the  Holy  Cross,  in  order  to  preserve  it  until 
the  Holy  Land  should  be  rescued  from  the  infidels,  and 
restored  entirely  to  its  former  state  ;  and  that  he  alone 
knew  of  this  hidden  treasure  ;  and  that  he  had  often 
been  pressed  hard  by  Saladin,  who  had  tried  to  make 
him  discover  the  cross,  by  the  most  searching  inquiries  ; 
but  that  he  had  always  baffled  his  questioners  by  am- 
biguous replies,  and  deluded  them  with  false  state- 
ments ;  and  that  on  account  of  his  contumacy  Saladin 
had  ordered  him  to  be  bound ;  but  he  persisted  in  as- 
serting that  he  had  lost  the  piece  of  the  cross  during 
the  taking;  of  the  citv  of  Jerusalem,  and  had  thus  de- 


A.D.  1191-1194.]  Richard's  prayer.  1G3 

luded  him  notwithstanding  his  anxiety  to  find  it.  Tlie 
king,  hearing  this,  set  out  immediately,  with  the  abbot 
and  a  great  number  of  people,  to  the  place  of  which 
the  abbot  had  spoken  ;  and,  having  taken  up  the  piece 
of  the  Holy  Cross  with  humble  veneration,  they  re- 
turned to  the  army  ;  and,  together  with  the  people,  they 
kissed  the  cross  with  much  piety  and  contrition." 

But,  as  might  be  expected  of  piety  and  contrition 
and  comfort  born  out  of  this  curious  mixture  of  devo- 
tion and  falsehood,  these  graces  did  not  keep  the  armies 
from  discord.  The  French  threatened  to  return.  Rich- 
ard prepared  to.  Saladin  collected  immense  forces,  and 
attacked  Acre  in  his  turn.  Richard  seized  the  chance 
for  his  peculiar  devotion.  "  He  was  sitting  in  his  tent 
talking  with  some  returning  officers,  when,  lo  !  messen- 
gers from  Joppa  entered,  and,  tearing  their  garments, 
related  to  the  king  how  the  enemy  had  taken  Joppa,  all 
but  the  citadel.  The  king,  hearing  of  the  danger  to 
which  the  besieged  were  exposed,  and  pitying  their 
condition,  interrupted  the  messengers.  '  As  God  lives,' 
said  he,  '  I  will  be  with  them,  and  give  them  all  the  as- 
sistance in  my  power.'  So  the  army  was  at  once  got 
ready,  and  moved  with  all  celerity.  But  at  Cayphas  a 
contrary  wind  arose,  and  detained  the  ships.  The 
king,  vexed  a:t  this  delay,  exclaimed  aloud,  '  O  Lord 
God  !  why  dost  thou  detain  us  here  ?  Consider,  I  pray 
thee,  the  urgency  of  the  case,  and  the  devoutness  of  our 
wishes.'  No  sooner  had  he  prayed  thus,  than  God 
caused  a  favorable  wind  to  spring  up,  which  wafted  his 
fleet  before  it  into  the  harbor  of  Joppa." 

The  king  stormed  the  town,  and  rescued  the  Chris- 


104  THE    CRUSADES.      [a.  D.  1191  -  1 194. 

tians  in  their  citadel.  And  thus  ends  the  account  of  his 
onslaught:  —  "The  king,  meanwhile,  with  brandished 
sword,  still  pursued  and  slaughtered  the  enemy,  who 
were  thus  inclosed  between  the  two  bodies  of  the  Chris- 
tians, and  filled  the  streets  with  their  slain.  Why  need 
I  say  more  ?  All  were  slain,  except  such  as  took  to 
flight  in  time  ;  and  thus  those  who  had  before  been  vic- 
torious were  now  defeated  and  received  condign  punish- 
ment, whilst  the  king  still  continued  the  pursuit,  showing 
no  mercy  to  the  enemies  of  Christ's  Cross,  whom  God 
had  given  into  his  hands  ;  for  there  never  was  a  man  on 
earth  who  so  abominated  cowardice  as  he." 

This  was  his  last  victory.  He  fell  sick,  and  was 
obliged  to  conclude  a  truce  of  three  years,  three  months, 
and  three  days,  with  the  enemy.  This  he  did  in  a  rage, 
as  may  be  seen  by  the  words  of  his  celebrated  prayer 
as  he  submitted  to  it.  The  king  had  ordered  "  that  it 
should  be  proclaimed  through  all  the  companies,  that  on 
the  third  day  they  must  follow  the  king  to  battle,  either 
to  die  as  martyrs,  or  to  take  Jerusalem  by  storm." 
When  the  day  came,  the  spirit  of  those  going  to  fight 
had  so  greatly  failed,  that  "there  were  not  found  of  all 
the  knights  and  shield-bearers  above  nine  hundred.  On 
account  of  which  defection,  the  king,  greatly  enraged, 
or  rather  raving,  and  champing  whh  his  teeth  the  pine 
rod  which  he  held  in  his  hand,  at  length  unbridled  his 
indignant  lips  as  follows:  —  'O  God!'  said  he,  'O 
God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ?  For  whom 
have  we  foolish  Christians,  for  whom  have  we  English, 
come  hither  from  the  farthest  parts  of  the  earth  to  bear 
our  arms  ?     Is  it  not  for  the  God  of  the  Christians  ?     O 


A.  D.  1191-1194.]       ANOTHER   PRAYER.  165 

fie  !  How  good  thou  art  to  us  thy  people,  who  now  are 
for  thy  name  given  up  to  the  sword  !  we  shall  become 
a  portion  for  foxes.  O,  how  unwilling  should  1  be  to 
forsake  thee  in  so  forlorn  and  dreadful  a  position,  were 
I  thy  lord  and  advocate,  as  thou  art  mine  !  In  sooth, 
my  standards  will  in  future  be  despised,  not  through 
my  fault,  but  through  thine  ;  in  sooth,  not  through  any 
cowardice  of  my  warfare  art  thou  thyself,  my  King 
and  my  God,  conquered  this  day,  and  not  Richard, 
thy  vassal.'  " 

Such  was  the  devotion  and  such  the  Christianity  of 
the  best  hero  of  the  third  Crusade.  It  needs  no  words 
to  show  that  such  men,  whatever  their  success  in  arms 
or  in  treaties,  could  do  little  to  carry  religion  anywhere. 
The  spirit  is  the  same  spirit  which  the  Prankish  King 
Clovis  had,  or  which  the  Emperor  Constantine  had,  or 
which  any  ambitious  Mussulman  or  heathen  might  have. 
Such  a  spirit  could  only  excite  hatred  of  the  cross 
which  the  Crusaders  wore.  And  their  enterprises  did 
unite  the  nations  of  Western  Asia  in  hatred  to  the 
Christian  name.  To  the  nations  of  Europe,  taxed  to 
carry  them  on,  suffering  by  the  loss  of  blood  which 
they  caused,  they  were  a  proclamation  of  the  most 
false  form  of  Christianity.  For  they  assumed  that  in 
some  sense  Christ's  kingdom  was  of  this  world,  and 
that  in  some  sense  he  was  the  leader  of  chivalry  and 
of  arms.  Thus  they  made  a  new  standard  for  Chris- 
tian attainment.  It  was  not  only  unlike  the  Gospel 
standard,  but  it  was  wholly  opposed  to  it.  And  in  al- 
most every  influence,  they  robbed  the  real  motives  of 
our  religion  of  their  pure  power. 


166        THE  SLEEP  OF  THE  PEOPLE,  [a.  D.  500-1500. 

They  did  strengthen  the  Popes.  That  they  were 
meant  to  do.  They  united  the  states  of  Europe  into  a 
sort  of  general  confederacy.  That  also,  as  we  have 
said,  Hildebrand  intended.  But  God  ordered  also,  what 
no  man  intended,  that  they  should  introduce  Eastern 
learning  into  Europe,  —  that  they  should  adjust  the 
power  of  the  nobility  of  Europe,  —  that  also,  while  they 
went  on,  the  great  middle  class  of  citizens  should  rise 
to  their  influence  in  the  state,  —  and  that  thus  popular 
freedom  should  be  born. 

NOTES   TO   CHAPTER  XIV. 

The  extracts  made  above  are  all  from  "  The  Voyage  of  Bernard 
the  Wise,"  A.  D.  867  ;  "The  Chronicle  of  Richard  of  Devizes, 
containing  the  Deeds  of  King  Richard  the  First,  King  of  Eng- 
land"; ar  from  "  Geoffrey  de  Vaisauf's  Chronicle  of  Richard  the 
First's  Crusade." 

These,  with  many  other  originals,  describing  different  journeys 
and  crusades  in  Palestine  and  other  parts  of  the  East,  make  two 
volumes  of  Bohn's  Antiquarian  Library,  referred  to  in  a  note  to 
Chapter  XII. 

James's  History  of  Chivalry  has  been  reprinted  in  this  country, 
and  is  easily  procured. 


CHAPTER    XV. 

THE    SLEEP    OF    THE    PEOPLE. 

There  is  a  common  complaint  that  history  tells  so 
much  of  the  princes  and  priests,  and  so  little  of  the  peo- 
ple. It  is  a  complaint  which  may  justly  be  made  of  the 
different  chapters  of  this  book,  since  we  left  Mary  of 


A.  D.  500-1500.]  A  vassal's  oath.  167 

Numidia.  But  the  fault  is  only  in  the  least  part  that 
of  the  historians,  when  they  are  writing  of  times  be- 
tween the  fifth  and  fifteenth  centuries.  Nothing  can 
be  told  of  the  deeds  of  people  who  did  nothing  ;  and 
through  the  whole  of  those  ten  centuries  the  great  mass 
of  the  laborers  of  Western  Europe  did  nothing  which 
could  be  taken  note  of,  but  what  their  masters  bade 
them  do. 

The  laboring  men  were,  in  all  instances,  the  vassals 
or  serfs  of  those  who  owned  the  land.  They  belonged 
to  the  land.  The  owner  could  not  sell  them  to  another 
owner  ;  but,  on  their  part,  they  could  not  leave  it  for 
another  home.  They  owed  him  service.  This  is  the 
oath  which  a  tenant  or  vassal  took  to  his  master :  — 

"  I,  A.  B.,  vassal,  swear  on  the  Holy  Evangelists  of 
God,  that  from  this  hour  to  the  last  day  of  my  life  I 
will  be  faithful  to  you,  C.  D.,  my  lord,  against  all  men, 
except  the  supreme  bishop,  the  emperor,  the  king,  or 
any  lord  whom  I  have  heretofore  acknowledged  as 
such." 

In  this  ceremony,  he  was  on  his  knees,  holding  his 
hands  joined  as  if  in  prayer,  and  the  lord  inclosing  them 
in  his.  If  the  owner  needed,  he  took  the  serfs  to  batde, 
and  they  fought  side  by  side  ;  if  the  lord  lost  his  horse, 
the  vassal  gave  him  his ;  and  if  the  lord  was  taken  pris- 
oner, the  vassal  was  bound  to  contribute  what  was  need- 
ed for  his  ransom. 

Such  people  had  no  influence.  Even  those  who,  just 
above  this  position,  held  a  little  property  of  their  own, 
had  none.  And  so  it  is  all  but  impossible  to  trace  them, 
or  their  daily  doings.     In  deeds  of  land,  you  find  the 


168      THE  SLEEP  OF  THE  PEOPLE,  [a.  D.  500- 1500. 

number  of  farmers  mentioned  who  were  sold  with 
the  land.  In  accounts  of  wars,  you  find  the  number 
of  the  vassals  who  followed  a  leader  to  the  wars.  In 
accounts  of  plagues,  you  find  the  number  of  victims 
mentioned  who  were  swept  away  by  the  contagion. 
But  such  notices  are  all  that  you  find.  What  they  were 
about,  what  they  were  doing,  and  how  they  did  it,  you 
cannot  find.  The  history  of  the  ten  centuries  which 
preceded  the  invention  of  printing  is  like  the  streets  of 
a  great  city  on  the  day  of  a  military  or  ecclesiastical 
procession,  when  all  laymen  or  civilians  are  ordered  to 
keep  out  of  the  way.  Nothing  but  cannons  and  pow- 
der-carts may  be  seen.  No  omnibuses,  no  wagons,  no 
wheelbarrows.  Nothing  but  soldiers  or  priests.  There 
are  no  children  playing,  no  women  shopping,  no  ped- 
lers,  no  street-sweepers  or  street-pavers,  and  no  errand- 
boys,  or  girls  coming  home  from  school. 

This  was  true  of  all  Christendom  till  the  dawn  of  the 
Reformation.  We  allude  to  it  here  that  we  may  once 
for  all  contrast  it  with  power  of  difl?erent  sorts  which 
has  controlled  Christian  civilization.  We  will  make 
some  extracts  which  shall  exhibit  it  in  England,  while 
Richard  was  away  on  his  Crusade. 

While  the  scenes  passed  described  in  the  last  chap- 
ter, there  were  at  home  such  men  as  are  here  described 
as  sitting  in  an  oak  forest  in  the  West  Riding  of  York- 
shire, in  England  :  — 

"  The  eldest  of  these  men  had  a  stern,  savage,  and 
wild  aspect.  His  garment  was  of  the  simplest  form 
imaginable,  being  a  close  jacket,  with  sleeves  composed 
of  the  tanned  skin  of  some  animal,  on  which  the  hair 


A.  D.  500- 1500.]     A    BORN    THRALL.  169 

had  been  originally  left,  but  which  had  been  worn  off 
in  so  many  places  that  it  would  have  been  difficult  to 
distinguish  from    the    patches    that    remained  to   what 

creature  the  fur  had  belonged The  man  had  no 

covering  upon  his  head,  which  was  only  defended  by 
his  own  thick  hair,  matted  and  twisted  together,  and 
scorched  by  the  influence  of  the  sun  into  a  rusty  dark- 
red  color,  forming  a  contrast  with  the  overgrown  beard 
upon  his  cheeks,  which  was  rather  of  a  yellow  or  amber 
hue.  One  part  of  his  dress  is  too  remarkable  to  be  sup- 
pressed ;  it  was  a  brass  ring,  resembling  a  dog's  collar, 
but  without  any  opening,  and  soldered  fast  round  his 
neck,  so  loose  as  to  form  no  impediment  to  his  breath- 
ing, yet  so  tight  as  to  be  incapable  of  being  removed, 
except  by  the  use  of  the  file.  On  this  singular  gorget 
was  engraved  in  Saxon  characters  an  inscription  of  the 
following  purport :  '  Gurth,  the  son  of  Beowulph,  is  the 
born  thrall  of  Cedric  of  Rotherwood.'  "  * 

This  description  is  Sir  Walter  Scott's,  the  best  his- 
torian yet  of  those  times.  Each  of  our  readers  must 
remember  that,  if  he  be  American-born,  of  the  "  native 
American  stock,"  the  most  of  his  ancestors  in  King 
Richard's  time  were  such  men,  or  the  wives  of  such 
men,  bound  in  such  allegiance  to  their  masters.  These 
masters  were  not  always  noblemen.  The  monasteries 
had  serfs,  as  corporations  now  hold  property.  And 
from  one  of  the  convent  historians  of  the  same  time 
comes  this  description  of  the  way  in  which  the  wives  of 
some  of  these  serfs  fared,  when  spinning  at  home.     It 

*  Ivanhoe,  Chap.  I. 
NO.  VIII.  15 


170       THE  SLEEP  OF  THE  PEOPLE,  [a.  D.  500-  1500. 

is  the  account  of  the  collection  of  the  repsehei'  due, 
which  the  tenants  of  the  convent  had  not  paid.  This 
was  the  penny  which  each  householder  had  to  pay  for 
reaping  the  convent  grain.  "  Our  store-keeper,"  says 
one  of  the  convent  historians,  "  goes  out  to  collect  it. 
The  rich  people  will  not  pay.  The  poor  people  have 
no  penny,  and  make  no  promises.  So  he  seizes  as 
pledge  for  it,  whatever  he  can,  —  here- a  joint-stool,  there 
a  kettle,  now  even  the  house-door  itself,  —  and  carries  it 
off,  v.'hile  the  old  women  rush  after  him  with  their  dis- 
taffs, abusing  him  and  threatening  him." 

In  such  a  system  of  civilization,  every  work  which 
is  undertaken  is  planned  by  the  owners  of  the  serfs. 
They  do  all  the  thinking  for  the  world.  Now,  Richard 
the  Lion-hearted  seems  to  us  a  great  way  off  from  us. 
He  lived,  indeed,  a  long  time  ago.  But  this  form  of 
power,  or  civilization,  is  still  believed  in  in  many  re- 
gions. It  is,  indeed,  the  arrangement  made  for  all  well- 
bred  children.  In  Mr.  Abbot's  excellent  Franconia 
books,  the  law  of  it  for  them  is  well  laid  down,  where 
we  are  told  that  Beechnut  made  the  plans  for  his  younger 
playmates  to  follow,  and  then  gave  to  their  hands,  as  far 
as  he  could,  the  execution.  It  is,  undoubtedly,  the  best 
way  to  manage  children.  In  all  slave  countries  it  is 
the  way  in  which  slaves  are  managed.  The  master  or 
overseer  makes  the  plans,  and  the  slaves  carry  out  the 
details,  —  bring  to  bear  the  handwork  which  shall  fulfil 
the  plans.  But,  in  a  larger  instance  than  these,  it  is  the 
rsal  theory  at  the  bottom  of  the  great  system  of  the  Ro- 
man Catholic  Church.  Where  that  Church  has  had  full 
sway,  the  civilization  of  the  world  has  been  arranged  in 


A.  D.  500-1500.]    CALIFORNIA    MISSIONS.  171 

this  way.  California,  for  instance,  which  is  now  the 
most  striking  illustration  of  the  opposite  system,  and 
shows  each  pair  of  hands  directed  by  one  head,  was 
settled  under  the  Catholic  system,  of  one  head  for  many 
hands.  It  was  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  Franciscans, 
a  Cntholic  brotherhood,  for  a  century  and  p  half.  They 
gave  the  name  of  San  Francisco,  their  founder,  to  our 
great  seaport  there.  They  established,  on  their  system, 
twenty  or  more  "  missions  "  up  and  down  the  country. 
In  these  missions  were  priests,  who  did  the  thinking  and 
planning  for  the  country  round.  They  won  upon  the 
simple  Indians.  They  taught  them  how  to  work.  They 
took  care  not  to  teach  them  how  to  think.  They  taught 
them  the  details.  They  took  care  to  keep  them  from 
originating.  The  Indians  formed  no  communities  of  their 
own.  They  nestled  under  the  missions'  wings.  They 
gathered  no  property  of  their  own.  They  took  care  of 
the  missions'  increasing  wealth.  It  was  the  missions' 
bees  whose  hives  they  tended,  the  missions'  cattle 
whom  they  reared,  the  missions'  fields  which  they 
ploughed  and  reaped.  With  the  priests  of  the  missions 
to  direct,  they  were  a  simple,  inoffensive  race,  and  an 
outside  aspect  of  cheerfulness,  wealth,  and  prosperity 
spread  over  the  land. 

But  it  was  an  unnatural  prosperity.  God  gives  every 
man  a  head  and  a  heart  when  he  gives  him  a  pair  of 
hands.  God  meant  that  each  pair  of  hands  should  work 
under  the  influence  of  its  owner's  mind,  obeying  its 
owner's  conscience.  He  did  not  mean  that  these  hun- 
dreds of  Indians,  for  instance,  should  be  nothing  but 
hand-workers,  rearing  children  who  should  be  only  such. 


172       THE  SLEEP  OF  THE  PEOPLE,  [a.  D.  500-  1500. 

And  thus,  so  unnatural  is  the  system,  that  it  never 
stands.  When  the  priests  were  swept  out  of  California 
by  a  popular  Mexican  revolution,  the  poor  Indian  vas- 
sals were  no  nearer  civilization  than  their  fathers  were 
before  the  Franciscans  came.  They  were  like  helpless 
cars  upon  a  railroad,  when  their  engine  has  been  thrown 
off  into  a  ravine.  They  could  not  direct  their  own 
hands,  they  could  not  plough  their  own  fields,  they  could 
hardly  collect  the  scattering  oxen  from  the  convent 
herds,  or  give  homes  to  the  swarms  of  the  convent  bees. 
And  so  the  beautiful  exterior  of  the  seeming  prosperity 
of  the  old  missions  fell  back  into  decay,  waiting  for  the 
Protestant  system  of  a  free  land  to  tiy  its  renewal. 
This  system  gives  each  man  his  own  chance,  professes 
to  leave  to  him  all  his  own  powers ;  and  if  he  carries 
out  the  plans  of  another,  it  is  because  he  chooses  so  to 
do,  and  so  far  makes  them  his  own. 

These  two  systems  are  yet  face  to  face  in  the  world. 
The  Protestant  system  is  nowhere  fully  carried  out, — 
perhaps  nowhere  farther  than  in  New  England.  The 
other  system  is  nowhere  fully  carried  out,  but  it  is  the 
basis  of  the  Roman  theoiy  everywhere.  The  submis- 
sion of  the  separate  conscience  is  the  point  which  dis- 
tinguishes a  Romanist  from  a  Protestant. 

NOTES  TO  CHAPTER  XV. 

Scott's  Ivanhoe  and  Betrothed  will  show  something  of  English 
domestic  Hfe  during  this  sleep  of  the  people. 

Mrs.  Cowden  Clarke's  story  of  Lady  Macbeth  -will  interest  yonng 
readers. 

Carlyle's  Past  and  Present  contains  extracts  from  the  convent 
history  quoted  above. 


A.  D.  1208-1226.]      EARLY   CHURCHES.  173 

In  Sir  George  Simpson's  Journey  round  the  World  is  a  spirited 
account  of  the  Franciscan  missions  in  California. 

Any  history  of  Paraguay  —  there  are  no  good  ones  —  illus- 
trates the  same  experiment,  as  the  Jesuits  tried  it  there. 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

OPPONENTS    OF   THE    ROMAN    POWER. THE  ALBIGENSES. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  Church  of  Rome, 
which  claimed  under  Pope  Gregory  such  power  as  we 
have  described,  embraced  all  Christians,  or  almost  all. 
Some  centuries  passed  after  Christ's  death  before  it  as- 
sumed any  power  over  other  churches.  Such  claims  as 
it  then  made  were  made  also  by  other  churches  which 
were  supposed  to  be  founded  by  Apostles,  as  that  at 
Antioch,  that  at  Alexandria,  and  that  at  Consta,ntinople. 
Over  these  churches,  and  almost  all  those  in  Asia,  the 
Roman  Church  has  never  had  any  more  authority  than 
has  the  First  Church  of  Boston.  The  Patriarch  of  Con- 
stantinople is  still  the  head  of  a  part  of  "  the  Greek 
Church."  Most  of  the  Eastern  churches,  and  those  of 
Northern  Africa,  were  swept  away  by  the  conquests  of 
the  Mussulmans.  The  Nestorian  church  in  Asia  Minor 
has  maintained  its  own  existence  to  this  day.  And  the 
same  may  be  said  of  many  scattered  communities  in 
different  parts  of  Western  Asia.  Under  a  scandalously 
corrupt  form  of  Christianity,  there  is  an  Abyssinian 
church  in  Africa,  which  has  no  connection  with  the 
Church  of  Rome,  but  which  has  existed  by  itself  from 
very  early  times. 
15* 


174  OPPONENTS  OF    ROME.       [a.  D.  1208- 1226. 


In  Western  Europe,  very  naturally,  the  Roman 
Church  had  more  power.  Until  the  Western  branch  of 
the  Roman  Empire  fell,  in  the  fifth  century,  Rome  was 
the  political  capital,  and  by  far  the  most  important  city 
of  those  parts  of  the  world.  From  Rome  came  most 
of  the  missionaries  who  converted  Franks  and  Saxons 
to  the  faith.  Rome  was,  in  some  sense,  their  home  and 
head-quarters.  When,  from  time  to  time,  an  ambitious 
Pope  made  pretensions  to  new  power,  they  cost  him 
nothing,  and  lost  him  nothing,  if,  as  usually  happened, 
they  failed.  But  where  they  succeeded,  he  made  so 
much  clear  gain  for  the  Roman  see. 

For  it  must  not  be  forgotten,  that,  in  those  centuries 
of  darkness,  there  was  nothing  whatever  of  what  we  call 
pubhc  opinion,  which  should  react  on  a  government 
which  made  absurd  demands.  And,  again,  there  was 
so  little  information  passing  between  country  and  coun- 
try, that  half  Europe,  even  Christian  Europe,  knew 
next  to  nothing  of  the  Pope,  and  the  Pope  knew  next  to 
nothing  of  them.  If  the  Popes  before  Hildebrand  had 
made  the  extravagant  claims  he  made  on  distant  prov- 
inces of  Europe,  they  would  have  been  almost  as  idle,  as 
if  some  village  minister  with  us  should  make  like  claims 
on  the  Empire  of  Japan.  The  people  of  half  Christen- 
dom would  never  hear  that  he  had  claimed  such  alle- 
giance. The  Christian  Britons  in  Wales  lived  foi 
centuries  without  any  intercourse  with  Rome.  When, 
afterwards.  Christians  went  from  England  to  Rome,  it 
was  as  formidable  a  pilgrimage  as  it  would  be  now  for 
a  man  to  walk  from  New  England  to  California.  And 
v/hen,  therefore,  Hildebrand,  or  Gregory  the  Seventh, 


A.  D.  1208-  1226.]   DISOBEDIENCE  TO  THE  POPE.     175 

began  his  exactions,  they  were  received  by  such  Eng- 
lish kings  as  William  the  Conqueror  and  William  Ru- 
fus  as  absurdities,  which  they  did  not  hesitate  to  inter- 
fere with  or  refuse. 

But  it  would  so  often  happen  that  priests,  and  ambi- 
tious priests,  were  statesmen  and  prime  ministers,  that 
they  bent  such  sovereigns  as  would  be  bent  to  submit 
to  the  Pope's  desires.  And  weak  kings  were  glad  to 
get  alHes  where  they  could.  So  John  of  England,  for 
instance,  agreed  to  pay  a  thousand  marks  annually  to 
the  Pope,  and  that  his  successors  should.  For  a  hun- 
dred and  thirty  years,  when  in  need  of  the  Pope's  alli- 
ance, the  English  kings  paid  it ;  when  strong  and  firm, 
they  refused  ;  and  the  last  payment  was  made  in  the 
year  1343,  just  before  the  Black  Death,  —  to  which  our 
next  chapter  relates,  —  two  hundred  years  before  Lu 
ther's  reformation.  It  stopped,  because  the  real  su- 
premacy of  the  Popes  was  even  then  at  end  for  ever. 

We  have  said  this  to  explain  how,  in  such  barbarous 
times,  all  Europe  knew  little  of  such  controversies 
about  religious  doctrine  as  disturb  religious  men  in 
enlightened  times.  It  was  not  that  the  Pope  had  any 
more  power  to  suppress  them  then  than  he  has  now, 
but  rather  that  he  had  less;  and  that  neither  he,  nor  any 
man,  had  the  means  or  disposition  to  bring  to  light  the 
variations  of  religious  sentiment  and  belief,  which  ex- 
isted then,  as  they  must  exist  where  there  are  separate 
men.  All  through  the  centuries  before  Luther  there 
are  instances  of  bishops  disobeying  the  Pope,  of  kings 
disregarding  his  claims,  —  indeed,  of  whole  nations  who 
lived  in  their  Christian  faith  as  if  there  were  no  Pope. 


176  OPPONENTS  OF  ROME.       [a.  d.  1208-  1226. 

The  king  of  Hungary  was  so  far  from  him,  that,  when 
the  Pope  crowned  him,  he  expressly  acknowledged  that 
he  and  his  successors  should  be  regarded  as  apostles, 
and  ordain  bishops  at  their  pleasure.  What  if,  in  such 
times,  a  village  priest  preached  doctrine  which  was  not 
the  doctrine  of  Rome  ?  Nay,  what  if  a  bishop  did  the 
same  thing .?  It  was  much  better,  that,  till  public  scan- 
dal called  attention  to  the  heresy,  it  should  be  let  alone, 
than  that  men's  attention  should  be  called  to  it.  Such 
heresies  were  let  alone,  till  the  invention  of  printing 
spread  them  broadcast,  and  then  the  pretence  of  uni- 
formity fell,  of  necessity. 

In  fact,  from  the  beginning,  there  were  everywhere 
Protestants,  —  men,  that  is,  who  never  gave  the  Pope 
any  power  over  their  Christianity.  There  were  sects, 
of  whom  those  in  the  Alps  became  famous,  who  held 
this  position  for  centuries.  Preachers,  writers,  and  men 
who  held  it,  without  becoming  famous,  were  every- 
where. Every  king  who  proceeded  without  Papal 
authority  is  an  evidence  that  there  was  an  influential 
sentiment  made  by  such  men  around  him.  Every 
heretic  of  whom  the  Church  chose  to  take  notice  is  an 
evidence  that  there  were  many  whom  it  passed  by. 
When  its  pride  began  to  fall,  —  when  in  the  fourteenth 
century  it  was  divided  against  itself,  and  Europe  was 
scandalized  by  the  sight  of  two  Popes  for  seventy 
years,  —  the  Protestant  voices' were  heard  all  over  Eu- 
rope. In  the  middle  of  that  centuiy,  the  convulsion  of 
the  pestilence  heaved  up  old  foundations,  so  that  from 
that  period  they  were  heard  the  more  loudly.  And  as 
the  new  forms  of  civilization  came  in,  a  part  of  them, 


A.  D.  1208-1226.]       TWO    HERETICS.  177 

both  cause  and  consequence,  was  a  series  of  attacks 
upon  the  power  of  the  Pope,  —  such  as  had  existed 
through  all  the  past  centuries,  but  which  till  now  hardly 
needed  to  be  so  expressed. 

There  is  no  century,  even  the  darkest,  from  which 
cannot  be  collected  expressions  of  indignation  against 
the  abuses  of  the  clergy,  and  bold  denials  that  it  was 
possible  that  any  man  should  hold  the  keys  of  faith. 
When  it  is  said,  that  in  any  nation  no  heresy  arose, 
as  was  once  said  of  England  by  a  flattering  Pope,  we 
are  to  understand,  that  it  was  a  nation  so  far  from  him 
that  he  had  not  heard  its  mutterings,  and  so  ignorant  of 
him  that  it  did  not  care  to  make  them  known.  We  will 
take,  as  a  single  instance  which  will  illustrate  the  treat- 
ment which  the  Roman  Church  had  for  heretics  when 
they  were  near  enough  to  attract  its  vengeance,  the 
fate  of  the  Albigenses. 

The  inhabitants  of  the  Alps  had  never  cared  for  the 
Pope.  The  people  of  mountains  are  apt  to  breathe 
free.  A  like  heresy  extended  in  the  beautiful  regions 
of  the  South  of  France.  Innocent  the  Third,  therefore, 
organized  a  crusade  against  the  heretical  Albigenses, 
so  called  from  Albi,  their  chief  seat  in  that  region,  who 
from  the  earliest  times  had  disregarded  the  power  of 
his  chair.  Its  commander  was  Count  Simon  de  Mont- 
fort.  The  following  details  will  illustrate  its  spirit. 
We  take  them  from  a  Catholic  historian  :  *  — 

"  At  Castres,  they  brought  before  the  Count  two  here- 
tics, of  whom  one  was  one  of  those  whom  they  call  the 

*  rieury. 


178  THE    ALBIGENSES.       [a.  D.  1208  -  1226. 

Perfected,  the  other  his  disciple.  The  Count,  after 
having  taken  counsel,  condemned  both  of  them  to  the 
flames,  although  the  disciple  declared  that  he  wished  to 
be  converted,  and  abjured,  indeed,  his  heresy.  '  For,' 
said  the  Count,  '  if  he  speaks  in  good  faith,  this  fire  will 
answer  for  an  expiation  of  his  sins ;  if  he  lies,  he  will 
suffer  the  penalty  of  his  imposture.'  Then  they  bound 
them  both  strongly  to  a  stake,  and  asked  the  novice,  in 
what  faith  he  chose  to  die.  '  I  renounce  heresy,'  said 
he  ;  '  I  wish  to  die  in  the  faith  of  the  holy  Roman 
Church,  and  I  pray  God  that  this  fire  may  serve  me  in- 
stead of  purgatoiy.'  They  then  lighted  a  great  fire 
around  the  stake,  which  in  a  moment  consumed  the 
'  perfected '  one,  and  burnt  the  bonds  of  the  novice, 
so  that  he  came  out  of  the  flame  safe  and  sound,  having 
only  the  ends  of  his  fingers  a  little  burned.  This  was 
regarded  as  a  miracle." 

In  such  a  vein  of  pleasantry  is  recorded  the  begin- 
ning of  a  series  of  atrocities  which  exposed  large  com- 
munities of  mountain  peasants  to  the  cruelties  of  an  im- 
mense army. 

"  Many  bishops,"  he  goes  on,  "  came  with  the  Cru- 
saders against  the  Albigenses.  The  Bishop  of  Paris 
joined  them,  during  the  siege  of  Lavaur,  which  was 
taken  by  assault  on  the  day  of  The  Finding  of  the  Holy 
Cross  (!),  May  3,  1211.  There  were  captured  Aimeri 
of  Montreal,  and  eighty  other  knights,  whom  the  Count 
de  Montfort  wished  to  hang.  They  began  with  Aimeri, 
but  the  gallows  fell,  having  been  carelessly  planted  in 
haste  ;  and  the  Count,  seeing  the  execution  thus  delayed, 
ordered  that  the  rest  should  be  killed.     The  pilgrims. 


A.  D.  1208  -  1226.]       THE    INQUISITION.  179 

obeyed  him  with  great  eagerness.  They  even  burned 
three  hundred  heretics,  and  by  order  of  the  Count  they 
threw  into  a  well  the  Lady  of  Lavaur,  the  sister  of 
Aimeri,  a  very  obstinate  heretic,  and  buried  her  in  a 
heap  of  stones.  The  Crusaders  then  took  a  castle 
named  Casser,  where  the  bishops  who  were  with  them 
entered,  and  began  to  exhort  the  heretics  ;  but  not  hav- 
ing been  able  to  convert  one,  they  left  the  castle  ;  and 
the  pilgrims,  taking  the  heretics,  about  sixty  in  number, 
burned  them  with  great  joy." 

This  terrible  war,  thus  conducted,  lasted  eighteen  years. 
At  the  siege  of  Bexiers,  when  thousands  were  massacred 
at  once,  it  was  that  a  monk  among  "  the  pilgrims," 
when  asked  how  the  Catholics  and  the  heretics  could  be 
distinguished  from  each  other,  made  the  terrible  answer, 
"  Kill  them  all !  God  will  know  his  own."  Montfort, 
the  leader,  was  to  have  an  independent  principality  for 
his  reward.  But  he  gained  one  more  fitting,  when,  at 
the  siege  of  Toulouse,  a  stone  fell  upon  him  and  crushed 
him  to  death.  Francisco  of  Assisi,  and  Dominic  of 
Toulouse,  were  both  in  this  terrible  expedition,  with 
some  of  their  followers.  They  had  just  begun  the  so- 
cieties of  clergy  nov/  known  as  the  Franciscans  and 
Dominicans.  The  Franciscans  are  organized  nominal- 
ly for  the  conversion  of  the  poor  ;  the  Dominicans,  who 
date  from  1215,  for  the  suppression  of  heresy.  These 
last  have  maintained  the  institution  of  the  Inquisition,  of 
which  Dominic  was  the  first  Inquisitor. 

The  country  of  the  Albigenses  was  the  South  of 
France,  and  on  their  ruin  the  principality  of  Toulouse 
also  fell.     Such  atrocities  in  no  sort  helped  the  Church 


ISO  THE  BLACK  DEATH.   [a. D.  1348  -  1350. 

which  contrived  them.  No  sooner  did  the  Reformation 
break  out  in  Switzerland  under  Zuingle  and  Calvin, 
than  it  found  a  home  at  once  on  this  oppressed  soil. 

NOTE  TO  CHAPTER  XVI. 

Browning's  History  of  the  Huguenots.  Reprinted.  Phila- 
delphia:  Lea  &  Blanchard.     1845. 

Dr.  Baird's  History  of  the  Waldenses.  Boston.  1845.  B.  Per- 
kins &  Co. 

Two  very  valuable  articles  by  Dr.  Sears,  on  Ullmann's  Re- 
formers before  the  Reformation,  in  Bibliotheca  Sacra,  Vols. 
I.,  II. 


CHAPTER    XVII. 

THE  BLACK  DEATH. 

"  He  lived,  he  died ;  behold  the  sum, 
The  abstract  of  the  historian's  page." 

It  is  true  enough,  that,  of  the  thirteen  centuries  which 
these  chapters  have  followed,  these  two  words,  lived 
and  died^  would  have  told  the  abridged  story.  We  see 
our  heroes  as  boys,  perhaps ;  they  grow  into  mature 
men,  and  then  in  old  age  pass  off,  other  boys  being  in 
their  places.  Each  century  begins  with  a  body  of  ac- 
tors wholly  different  from  those  with  which  the  century 
before  began.  And  yet  this  one  universal  fact,  the 
death  of  all  the  actors,  is  not  the  fact  of  which  history 
speaks.  It  takes  a  few  years  of  their  active  lives  ;  and 
the  last  words  of  the  death-bed,  or  its  last  struggles,  are 


A.D.  1348-1350.]       A  YEi\R  OF  DEATH.  181 

really  almost  as  little  to  it  as  the  first  movings  of  the 
cradle.  Millions  of  last  partings  had  filled  up  these 
thirteen  centuries.  But  the  world  had  taken  them  as 
of  course.  There  was  not  a  minute  in  which  some  one 
somewhere  was  not  dying.  Still,  because  this  was  of 
course,  festival  and  war  and  eager  business  pressed  on, 
all  the  time,  as  if  there  were  no  death.  It  is  so  now. 
All  men  know  now,  that,  of  every  forty  persons  round 
them,  one  will  be  dead  before  a  year  is  over.  Of  the 
next  forty  persons  you  meet  by  accident  in  the  street 
after  you  have  read  this  chapter,  it  is  as  certain  as  is 
any  thing  human,  that  some  one,  at  least,  is  within  a 
twelvemonth  of  his  grave.  But  this  certainty,  because 
it  is  the  established  certainty,  does  not  check  one  step 
or  one  smile. 

But  in  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century.  Death 
spoke  to  the  world  with  a  voice  which,  for  once, 
stopped  festival,  war,  and  eager  care.  In  the  yenr 
1348,  there  began  in  Europe  a  plague  which  had  been 
sweeping  Asia.  It  cut  right  across  the  acts  of  Euro- 
pean life.  It  stopped  wars  ;  it  silenced  revelry  ;  it  left 
ships  on  the  seas  without  seamen  ;  it  left  gold  in  the 
streets  with  none  to  pick  it  up.  In  six  months  its  havoc 
in  one  nation  would  be  over,  and  it  would  pass  to  anoth- 
er. In  three  years  of  such  passing  to  and  fro,  it  had 
swept  through  Europe.  And  there  is  no  doubt,  that,  of 
all  who  lived  in  Europe  when  those  three  years  began, 
more  than  a  quarter  part  were  in  their  graves  when 
they  were  over.  Of  any  single  country,  this  might  be 
said  of  the  year  when  the  plague  struck  it, —  that  of  those 
alive  when  the  year  began,  only  three  in  four  survived 

wo.  vni,  16 


182      ,      THE  BLACK  DEATH.   [a.  D.  1348  -  1350. 

the  year.  Of  some  countries  the  fate  was  worse. 
Cyprus  lost  ahnost  all  its  inhabitants.  Italy  lost  half  its 
people.  In  Sardinia  only  a  third  survived  ;  and  it  was 
so  in  Padua.  Travellers  from  Italy  to  Bohemia  found 
cities  and  villages  where  no  living  person  was  left. 
The  English  historians  of  the  time  thought  nine  tenths 
of  their  countrymen  died.  It  is  certain  that  more  than 
half  did.  There  were  places  in  France  where  it  was 
known  that  only  two  persons  out  of  twenty  survived. 
The  least  estimate  of  its  results  in  Europe,  taking  fa- 
vored regions  with  those  which  suffered  most,  is  that 
which  we  have  made.  Twenty-five  million  persons,  a 
quarter  of  the  hundred  million  who  were  alive  when 
this  pestilence  entered  Europe,  had  sunk  under  its  ter- 
rible touch  before  three  years  were  over. 

Famine  followed.  Who  should  till  the  land,  when  in 
every  house  was  death,  and  when  every  man  dared  not 
draw  near  his  neighbor  ?  For  the  plague  was  terribly 
contagious.  Mothers  took  it  from  their  children  ;  hus- 
bands from  the  wives  whose  deaths  they  watched. 
"  Flight  was  of  no  avail  to  the  timid  ;  for  their  clothes 
were  saturated  with  the  pestiferous  atmosphere,  and 
every  inspiration  imparted  to  them  the  seeds  of  the 
destructive  malady,  which  germinated  only  too  rapidly." 
There  were,  as  in  all  cases  of  pestilence,  shocking  in- 
stances of  unchristian  cowardice,  by  which  the  dying 
were  deserted  by  the  living  who  were  afraid.  But 
there  were,  as  in  all  cases  now,  glorious  instances  of 
Christian  bravery.  There  were  physicians  who  studied 
the  disease  with  all  the  gallantry  of  the  noblemen  of 
their  profession,  and   hung  over  the  sufferers  with  all 


4.  D.  1348-1350.]       THE   JEWS    ACCUSED.  183 

the  tenderness  with  which  they  could  ask  to  be  watched 
themselves. 

In  Avignon,  where  the  Pope  was  living,  driven  out 
of  Rome  at  the  time,  he  consecrated  the  river  Rhone 
as  a  place  of  burial,  that  the  dead  might  be  thrown 
there  without  delay.  Many  a  river  received  them 
which  had  not  been  consecrated.  In  England  the  sit- 
tings of  Parliament,  and  of  almost  all  the  courts,  stopped. 
They  were  in  presence  of  a  Greater  Law  than  man''s. 
The  Pope,  with  the  plague  for  his  ally,  adjusted  the 
bloody  quarrel  between  Edward  the  Third  and  Philip 
the  Second.  For  they  were  in  face  of  a  more  terri- 
ble soldier  than  either.*  Beasts  died  as  did  men. 
They  fell  in  their  pastures.  And  the  eagles  and  vul- 
tures, for  once,  did  not  gather  where  they  fell.  They 
shunned  the  certain  death  that  was  in  a  repast  so  ter- 
rible. 

As  if  these  horrors  were  not  enough,  the  cruelty  of 
men  added  to  them.  At  Chillon,  on  the  beautiful  Lake 
of  Geneva,  an  absurd  charge  was  made  against  the 
Jews,  that  they  had  poisoned  the  wells.  They  were 
tried,  and  tortured  on  trial.  At  once,  in  the  horror 
of  the  times,  the  same  accusation  was  made  else- 
where. A  few,  to  save  themselves  from  the  agony  of 
the  torture,  confessed  falsely  that  they  were  guilty. 
Their  weakness  brought  renewed  suffering  on  their 
miserable  race.     As  the  panic  grew,  a  distinct  charge 

*  And  yet,  when  this  terrible  soldier,  Death,  withdrew,  these 
two  children,  as  they  would  seem,  whom  his  terror  had  awed,  fell 
to  blows  again,  —  with  other  troops,  indeed,  for  their  own  armies 
were  gone. 


184  THE  BLACK  DEATH.   [a.  D.  1348- 1350. 

was  framed  against  them  all,  which,  though  it  had  no 
foundation,  was  greedily  believed.  It  was  everywhere 
reported  that  certain  secret  superiors,  in  Toledo  in 
Spain,  gave  them  their  directions  and  means  of  opera- 
tion. These  leaders  were  said  to  command  all  Jews  to 
commit  this  poisoning,  to  murder  Christian  children,  and 
to  work  other  atrocities.  It  was  said  that  they  taught 
the  rich  men  and  Rabbis  how  to  distil  poison  from 
spiders,  owls,  and  other  venomous  animals,  and  sent  it, 
indeed,  in  bags  of  powder  from  Toledo.  Such  bags 
were  often  found  in  wells,  and  although  the  poor  hunted 
Jews  frequently  proved  that  Christians  had  put  it  in,  to 
give  occasion  for  murder  and  pillage,  none  the  less  did 
the  rumors  founded  on  such  discoveries  —  rumors  so 
fatal  to  them  —  spread  through  all  Europe. 

The  gates  of  cities  were  guarded  with  the  greatest 
caution,  lest  poisoners  should  come  in.  All  strangers 
were  searched,  and  of  whatever  drug  they  had  with 
them  they  were  obliged  to  swallow  a  part,  as  a  test  that 
it  was  innocent.  The  noble  and  mean  alike  bound 
themselves  by  an  oath  to  extirpate  the  Jews  by  fire  and 
sword,  and  to  snatch  them  from  their  protectors,  of 
whom,  indeed,  there  were  so  few,  that  in  all  Germany 
there  are  but  few  places,  it  is  said,  which  were  not 
stained  then  with  the  iniquity  of  the  burning  of  these 
unfortunate  people.  And  their  fate  seems  to  have  been 
as  sad  in  France  and  England.  They  were  burned  by 
hundreds,  in  buildings  to  which  they  had  been  forced  to 
retreat.  At  Spires,  in  despair,  they  assembled  in  their 
own  houses,  which  they  set  on  fire. 

The    Senate   of  Strasburg,   after  two  thousand   had 


A.  D.  1348-1350.]     HISTORY    OF    IT.  185 

been  burned  alive  in  their  own  burial-ground,  ordered 
all  pledges  and  bonds  to  be  returned  to  the  debtors,  and 
divided  their  money  among  the  work-people.  There 
were,  as  it  is  happy  to  see,  some  men  who  would  not 
take  the  price  of  blood,  —  and  from  them  it  passed  to 
the  monasteries.  This  distribution  of  money,  for  an 
instant,  stopped  the  dread  of  the  omnipresent  plague. 
But  it  soon  reminded  the  cruel  people  of  its  power ; 
and  the  historian  says,  sadly,  of  this  gold  which  the  un- 
happy Jews  had  collected,  "  This  was  the  real  poison 
which  killed  the  Jews." 

In  such  horrors  three  years  went  by.  But  God  had 
not  forgotten  Europe,  and  he  swept  the  plague  away. 
Laborers  sprung  forward,  and  gained  high  wages,  where 
they  had  starved  before.  Farms  produced  bountifully. 
New  cattle  took  the  place  of  the  old.  No  one  knew, 
of  course,  what  would  have  been  if  the  plague  had  not 
come,  —  and  at  the  end  of  a  hundred  years  no  man 
lived  who  remembered  its  horrors.  And  so,  to-day, 
there  is  not,  perhaps.,  a  general  history  of  the  time, 
which  does  not  spend  as  much  space  in  telling  how  in 
one  of  those  three  years  King  Edward  picked  up  the 
garter  of  the  Countess  of  Salisbury,  as  in  telling  of  the 
havoc  which  swept  into  another  world  so  many  millions 
of  King  Edward's  brothers  and  sisters. 

But  although  books  thus  pass  it  by,  that  larger  rec- 
ord which  is  found  in  the  condition  of  society  shows 
everywhere  the  results  which  sprung  from  the  almost 
instantaneous  death  of  a  quarter  of  the  world.  Such  a 
convulsion  leaves  its  traces,  whether  men  write  of  it  or 
not.     And  of  all  the  institutions  of  Europe  there  is  not 


186  THE  BLACK  DEATH,  [a.  D.  1348- 1350. 

one  which  was  not  bent  by  so  tremendous  a  blow  to 
every  man,  woman,  and  child  who  lived  under  those 
institutions. 

Thus  all  property,  all  over  Europe,  changed  hands, 
and  passed  from  class  to  class.  If  these  deaths  had 
been,  as  usual,  spread  over  thirty  or  forty  years,  it 
would  have  changed  hands ;  but  then  it  would  have 
passed  from  merchant  to  merchant,  from  noble  to  noble, 
—  passing  in  most  cases  from  father  to  son.  Now,  the 
richest  merchants  turned  from  their  dying  wives,  their 
dead  children,  with  no  such  love  of  their  worldly  goods 
but  that  they  would  gladly  give  them  up  for  a  hope  of 
heaven.  They  rushed  with  their  gold  to  the  convents. 
Often  the  monks  feared  them  more  than  they  loved 
gold.  They  shut  their  gates  against  the  tempting  pes- 
tilence. Still,  the  precious  treasures  were  thrown  over 
the  convent  walls.  At  whatever  sacrifice,  the  fright- 
ened sufferers  sought  prayers.  And  the  wealth,  else 
unaccountable,  of  many  of  the  monasteries  of  Europe, 
which  lived  for  centuries  after,  is  to  be  ascribed  to  the 
gifts  or  the  residuary  legacies  which  they  then  gained 
from  dying  or  dead  men.  The  monks  might  fall,  and 
did,  under  the  pestilence  ;  but  the  associations,  the  mon- 
asteries, survived,  to  enjoy  the  treasures  of  those  who 
had  gone. 

It  is  said  that  the  charitable  orders  of  monks  were 
generally  firm  against  the  fear  of  contagion,  and  did 
their  duty  to  the  suffering.  The  pestilence,  however, 
mflicted  a  worse  blow  on  them  than  the  death  of  their 
members.  The  suffering  it  caused  brought  on,  of 
course,  the  most  eager  piety,  —  the  most  anxious  study 


A.  D.  1348-1350.]        ITS    EFFECTS.  1R7 

of  the  way  to  heaven.  Men's  only  desire  was  eternity. 
So  true  and  natural  a  wish  gained  but  httle  relief  in  the 
religion  of  those  times.  There  sprung  up  crazy  bands 
o^  jlagellants^  who  traversed  Europe,  scourging  them- 
selves, each  man,  for  thirty-four  days  ;  and  promising 
heaven  to  all  who  would  do  the  like.  Multitudes  of  be- 
reaved men  joined  the  orders  of  the  clergy,  to  fill  the 
vacant  places,  who  had  themselves  no  claim  to  such 
trust  but  the  claim  which  was  universal  in  those 
days,  of  broken  hearts  and  sadness  seeking  cure.  And 
thus  at  this  instant  literature,  which  was  just  awaken- 
ing, and  the  scientific  study  of  theology,  received  a  per- 
ceptible check,  of  which  the  Black  Death  is  the  simple 
cause. 

Wickliffe,  of  whom  we  are  to  speak,  was  already 
questiomng  the  power  of  Rome.  Soon  after,  Huss  awa- 
kened all  Germany  with  the  same  questions.  The  Pa- 
pal supremacy  died  in  this  century.  It  never  has  been, 
it  never  will  be,  what  it  was  before.  Again,  as  trade, 
as  agriculture,  as  commerce,  resumed  their  channels,  it 
was  with  new  arrangements,  each  one  of  which  rec- 
ognized a  people  starting  into  life.  That  people  might 
have  waited  long  for  the  advance  which  this  sudden 
convulsion  brought  to  them.  Perhaps  the  contagion 
taught  all  men  that  lesson  which  contagion  does  teach 
so  terribly,  that  all  men  are  of  one  blood,  —  that  the 
richest  is  the  own  brother  of  the  poorest. 

However  this  may  be,  it  is  certain  that  the  men  of 
work,  the  men  of  war,  the  priests,  the  monks,  and  the 
Papacy  itself,  all  felt  the  tremendous  change  which  the 
Black  Death  brought  to  Europe,  and  that,  through  them, 
its  influences  remain  to  this  i\r{y^ 


188  WICKLIFFE    AND    HUSS.  [a.  D.  1348. 

From  its  day  to  this  day,  there  has  been  a  power  to 
the  people  ;  —  the  people  began  to  wake  from  the  sleep 
we  have  described.  Two  years  before  it  began,  at  the 
battle  of  Crecy,  the  first  cannon-shot  was  heard  which 
was  ever  heard  in  battle.  With  that  shot  the  old  dis- 
tinction between  mailed  knight  and  half-naked  vassal 
ended  of  course.  Hired  troops  at  once  began  to  take 
place  of  levies  of  retainers.  The  change  in  arms  came 
side  by  side  with  the  change  in  society. 

Till  the  Black  Death,  all  Europe  seemed  in  a  lethar- 
gic sleep.  From  the  date  of  that  calamity,  history  has 
action  and  motion  to  describe. 

NOTE    TO    CHAPTER    XVII. 

Babington's  ti-anslation  of  Ilecker's  Treatise  on  the  Black 
Death,  published  by  the  Sydenham  Society,  collects  all  the  author- 
ities I  have  been  usinsj. 


CHAPTER    XVIII. 

WICKLIFFE    AND    HUSS. 

John  Wickliffe  was  at  Oxford,  in  college,  when  in 
a  twelvemonth  the  Black  Death  swept  half  England 
into  its  grave.  He  had  been  eight  years  a  student.  He 
was  now  twenty-four  yearc  old, — just  ready  to  begin 
life  as  a  preacher.  It  would  be  strange  if  a  young 
man,  starting  on  such  a  duty  in  the  midst  of  such  des- 
olation, seeing  all  around  him  hardened  men  driven  to 
prayer,  should  have  bent  to  say  any  thing  which  he  did 


A.  D.   1348.]     THE  GOOD  PARLIAMENT.  189 

not  feel  to  be  God's  own  truth.  At  such  a  time,  a  true 
man  would  fear  God  more  than  a  distant  Pope.  And 
John  Wickliffe  was  a  true  man.  So  that  it  proved  to  be 
thus  with  him. 

Wickliffe  joined  in  the  opinion  of  those  who  thought 
the  terrible  pestilence  a  sign  of  the  speedy  end  of  the 
world.  The  first  attack  he  made,  in  writing,  on  the 
wretchedly  corrupt  system  of  the  Church,  was  in  a  lit- 
tle book  called  "  The  Last  Age  of  the  Church,"  writ- 
ten to  show  that  by  the  end  of  that  century  the  world 
would  end.  The  pestilence,  he  said,  was  a  special  evi- 
dence of  this.  And  without  fear  or  favor  he  went  on  to 
arraign  the  vices  of  the  clergy.  He  declared  that  with 
them  was  the  seat  of  the  nation's  danger ;  and  that  in 
their  reformation  must  the  nation  and  the  world  be  pre- 
pared for  its  doom.  In  nearly  forty  years  of  life  after- 
wards, he  probably  learned  that  his  interpretation  of 
prophecy  was  hasty.  But  in  all  that  time  he  was  deal- 
ing as  heavy  blows  of  reform  as  could  be  dealt  by  any 
man,  on  the  rotten  structure  which  then  called  itself  the 
Church.  He  attacked  the  begging  friars.  He  sus- 
tained the  king  in  his  refusal  to  pay  tribute  to  the  Pope. 
He  lent  his  influence  to  "  the  good  Parliament,"  which 
enacted  that  no  Papal  "  collector  or  proctor,"  *  seeking 
to  remit  money  to  the  Pope,  should  remain  in  England, 
on  pain  of  life  and  limb.  He  passed  triumphantly 
through  ecclesiastical  trials  and  Papal  bulls.  He  de- 
nounced the  absurdity  and  scandal  of  the  double  Pope- 
dom then  existing.     He  maintained  constantly  that  the 

♦  We  should  say  "  agent.'* 


190  WICKLIFFE    AND    HUSS.  [a.  D.  1348. 

Scriptures  only  were  the  fountain  of  truth,  and  that 
each  human  soul  was  supreme  over  pope,  bishop,  or 
priest,  in  its  right  to  judge  of  truth  and  to  gain  it.  That 
all  Englishmen  might  have  this  privilege,  he  added  to 
his  other  gigantic  labors  a  translation  of  the  Bible. 
This,  through  many  changes  of  language,  still  survives, 
as  the  basis  of  the  translation  in  use  to-day.  Against 
such  a  man,  the  Popes  used  all  their  power.  But  Eng- 
land was  not  unused  to  heresy,  nor  afraid  of  it.  Wick- 
liffe  was  protected  in  high  quarters,  and  died  quietly  in 
his  bed  in  the  height  of  influence  among  his  own  peo- 
ple,—  a  most  striking  instance  of  the  value  to  the  world 
of  one  energetic  man.  For  Wickliffe  had  no  exalted 
station.  But  he  had  what  was  better,  —  a  soul  which  he 
was  trying  to  save,  and  a  heart  to  help  other  men  save 
theirs. 

We  shall  have  room  only  for  a  passage  or  two  from 
his  sermons,  and  some  specimens  of  his  Bible.  His 
sermons,  not  once  or  twice  only,  but  often,  or,  indeed, 
almost  always,  speak  directly  of  the  Papacy  as  Anti- 
christ. In  a  sermon  on  this  point  come  in  these 
words  :  — 

"  Popes  and  kings,  therefore,  should  seek  a  reason 
above  their  own  will,  for  such  blasphemy  often  bringeth 
to  men  more  than  the  pride  of  Lucifer.  He  said  he 
would  ascend  and  be  like  the  Most  High  ;  but  he  chal- 
lenged not  to  be  the  fellow  of  God  [as  the  Popes  do, 
is  the  intimation].  May  God  bring  down  this  pride,  and 
help  that  his  word  may  reverse  that  of  the  fiend  ! 
Well  indeed  I  know,  that,  when  it  is  at  the  highest,  this 
smoke  shall  disappear." 


A.  D.  1348.]  THE    BIBLE    TRANSLATED.  191 


Again  :  "  Prelates,  as  the  Pope  and  friars,  may  fail , 
accordingly  Christ  and  his  Apostles  converted  the  world 
by  making  known  to  them  the  truths  of  Scripture  in  a 

language  familiar  to  the  people All  Christians 

must  come  before  the  judgment-seat  of  Christ,  and  be 
answerable  to  him  for  all  the  goods  wherewith  he  has 
intrusted  them  [including  the  Scriptures].  It  is  there- 
fore needful  that  all  the  faithful  should  know  these 
goods,  and  the  use  of  them  ;  for  an  answer  by  prelate 
or  attorney  will  not  then  avail,  but  every  one  must  then 
answer  in  his  own  person." 

His  passion  for  circulating  the  Bible  was  his  leading 
motive.  He  studied  it  at  college,  when  its  study  was 
laughed  at  even  by  theologians.  And  he  succeeded  in 
scattering  it  widely,  although  in  manuscript,  through 
England.  A  few  specimens  of  his  version  in  the  lan- 
guage of  the  time  shall  close  our  notice  of  the  most 
fearless  and  most  powerful  reformer  England  ever 
knew. 

"  And  Jhesus  seinge  the  people  went  up  into  a  hil  ; 
and  whanne  he  was  sett,  his  disciplis  camen  to  him 
And  he  openyde  his  mouthe,  and  taughte  hem  ;  and 
seide,  Blessid  be  pore  men  in  spirit ;  for  the  kingdom  of 
hevenes  is  herun.  Blessid  ben  milde  men  ;  for  thei 
schulen  weelde  the  erthe.  Blessid  ben  thei  that  mourn- 
en ;  for  thei  schal  be  coumfortid.  Blessid  be  thei  that 
hungren  and  thristen  rigtirsnesse  ;  for  thei  schal  be  ful- 
filled. Blessid  ben  merciful  men  ;  for  thei  schal  gete 
mercy.  Blessid  ben  thei  that  ben  of  clene  herte  ;  for 
thei  schulen  se  god.  Blessid  ben  pesible  men  ;  for  thei 
schulen  be  clepid  goddis  children." 


192  WICKLIFFE   AND    HUSS.  [a.  D.  1414. 

"  At  the  beginning  was  the  word,  and  the  word  was 
at  god,  and  god  was  the  word  this  was  in  the  beginning 
at  god.  Alle  things  weren  maad  bi  him  :  and  withouten 
him  was  maad  nothing.  That  thing  that  was  maad  in 
him  was  lif.  And  the  lif  was  the  light  of  men.  And 
light  schineth  in  darknessis  and  darknessis  compre- 
hendid  not  it." 

Thirty  years  after  Wickliffe's  death,  the  Council  of 
Constance  ordered  that  his  body  should  be  dug  up  and 
burned.  This  was  done,  and  his  ashes  thrown  into  the 
Swift  brook.  "  Thus  this  brook,"  says  Fuller,  "  has 
conveyed  his  ashes  into  Avon,  Avon  into  Severn,  Sev- 
ern into  the  narrow  seas,  they  into  the  main  ocean. 
And  thus  the  ashes  of  Wickliffe  became  the  emblems  of 
his  doctrine,  which  now  is  dispersed  all  the  world  over." 

It  was  all  the  Council  of  Constance  could  do.  They 
could  not  check  the  work  his  soul  had  wrought  for  the 
downfall  of  their  pretensions. 

The  Council  of  Constance  was  the  most  splendid  and 
the  largest  assembly  of  the  dignitaries  of  the  Church 
which  has  ever  come  together.  It  met  in  1414,  for  a 
purpose  important  enough  to  engage  the  Catholic 
Church's  attention,  if  it  meant  to  remain,  in  pretence 
even,  one  body.  There  had  been  two  Popes  for  a  hun- 
dred years.  By  this  time  there  were  three.  The  Coun- 
cil of  Constance  was  an  assembly  where  the  Patriarchs 
of  Constantinople,  of  Grado,  and  of  Antioch,  had  been 
induced  to  come,  —  with  twenty-two  Catholic  cardinals, 
two  or  three  thousand  of  the  lower  clergy,  students 
of  various  universities,  and  one  thousand  six  hundred 
princes  and  noblemen,  with  their  immense  retinue,  so 


A.  D.  1415.]      A  TRIAL  FOR  HERESY.  193 

that  the  whole  number  who  attended  was  a  hundred 
thousand  men. 

They  unmade  all  three  of  the  Popes,  and  made  an- 
other. Another  act  of  theirs  has  given  them  more 
fame.  John  Huss  had  been  not  long  before  the  presi- 
dent of  a  famous  college  in  Bohemia.  The  queen  of 
England  in  that  time  was  a  Bohemian  princess.  Com- 
munication was  thus  opened  between  the  two  nations, 
and  a  young  Bohemian  nobleman,  returning  from  the 
University  at  Oxford,  put  into  Huss's  hands  some  of  the 
writings  of  VVicklifTe,  who  was  now  dead.  Huss  read 
them.  He  had  been  satisfied  himself  of  the  corruption 
of  the  clergy.  Wickliffe's  clear  statements  excited  him 
the  more,  and  he  preached  and  acted  more  earnestly 
than  ever  to  check  the  corruptions  of  the  Church.  All 
sorts  of  controversies  followed.  Finally,  the  Pope  ex- 
communicated Huss  as  a  heretic,  and  he  retired  to  his 
native  place  from  the  University.  The  Council  of  Con- 
stance, itself  acknowledging  numerous  corruptions  in 
the  Church,  sent  for  him  to  be  present.  The  Emperor 
Sigismund  gave  him  a  safe-conduct  to  protect  him  on 
his  way.  Huss  trusted  it.  This  proved  to  be  his  great- 
est error. 

He  was  tried  on  various  charges,  many  of  which  were 
true,  such  as  these  :  — 

That  he  had  said  that  there  was  no  absolute  neces- 
sity for  a  visible  head  to  the  Church  ; 

That  the  Church  was  better  governed  in  Apostolic 
times  without  one ; 

That  a  wicked  Pope  could  not  possibly  be  the  Vicar 
of  Christ ; 

NO.  VIII.  17 


194  WICKLIFFE   AND   HUSS.  [a.  D.  1415. 

That  liberty  of  conscience  was  every  man's  natural 
right ;  —  and  many  others. 

In  his  examination,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  attack  the 
simony,  the  lewdness,  ignorance,  and  luxury  of  the 
clergy.  The  great  assembly  of  them  behaved  with  the 
most  scandalous  clamor  while  his  trial  went  on.  He 
would  not  abjure  what  he  had  said.  The  Emperor  was 
persuaded  that  his  pledge  for  Huss's  safety  was  void,  by 
the  shameless  doctrine  embodied  in  a  solemn  decree  of 
the  assembly,  "  that  no  faith  or  promise  ought,  by  nat- 
ural, divine,  or  human  law,  to  be  kept,  if  it  conflict  with 
the  Catholic  faith."  And  Huss  was  sentenced  to  be 
burned.  The  substance  of  the  sentence  is,  "  that  John 
Huss,  being  a  disciple  of  Wicklifle,  of  damnable  mem- 
ory, whose  life  he  had  defended  and  whose  doctrines 
he  had  maintained,  is  adjudged  by  the  Council  to  be  an 
obstinate  heretic."  After  various  insults,  he  was  led  to 
the  Emperor.  The  Council  had  done  all,  they  said, 
which  the  Church  allowed.  As  was  said  on  another 
similar  occasion,  they  had  "  no  power  to  put  a  man  to 
death."  Sigismund  ordered  the  Duke  of  Bavaria  to 
take  him,  and  he  gave  him  to  an  officer  to  be  burned. 

One  of  the  bishops  had  placed  on  his  head  a  paper 
cap,  with  pictures  of  devils  painted  in  horrid  forms  upon 
it.  "  Hereby,"  said  he,  "  we  commit  thy  soul  to  the 
Devil."  Huss  smiled,  and  said,  "  It  is  less  painful  than 
a  crown  of  thorns."  When  he  came  to  the  stake  he 
prayed,  and  at  this  moment,  so  earnest  was  his  prayer, 
that  some  of  the  spectators  cried  out,  "  What  this  man 
hath  said  within  doors  we  know  not,  but  surely  he  pray- 
eth  like  a  Christian." 


A.  D.  1415.]  leutze's  picture.  195 

It  is  at  this  moment  that  Leutze's  great  picture  repre- 
sents this  scene.  To  one  who  has  seen  that  picture  it 
becomes  a  reality.  A  group  of  peasantry  watching 
him  with  eager  sympathy,  and  some  with  perfect  faith  ; 
a  cardinal,  who  has  passed  the  eagerness  of  his  own 
youth,  when  he,  too,  hoped  the  Church  might  be  re- 
formed, and  now  shows,  in  the  terrible  expression  of  a 
calm  face,  intellectual  and  cultivated,  that  his  head  has 
got  the  better  of  his  heart,  —  that  he  has  learned  to  acqui- 
esce in  what  is,  rather  than  what  might  be  ;  the  Duke 
of  Bavaria,  far  more  tolerant,  more  distressed,  while  he 
submits  to  the  decision  of  the  Church,  which  ought  in- 
deed to  know  ;  and  the  kneeling  martyr  himself,  for 
whom  the  pile  is  already  lighted,  make  the  prominent 
features  of  the  sad  picture ;  which,  however,  like  all  pic- 
tures of  martyrdom,  is  a  picture  of  triumph.  "  I  have 
no  errors  to  retract,"  he  said.  "  I  have  tried  to  preach 
Christ  with  the  plainness  of  an  apostle.  I  am  ready  to 
seal  my  doctrine  with  my  blood."  The  fire  was 
lighted,  he  asked  God's  blessing,  and  sang  a  hymn  till 
his  voice  was  stifled. 

His  ashes,  too,  were  scattered  in  the  river,  and  so  in 
the  sea.  His  name  was  carried  by  the  Council's  mem- 
bers to  the  end  of  Christendom.  He  suffered  July  6, 
1415.  His  friend  Jerome  of  Prague,  after  a  glorious 
defence,  suffered  in  like  manner,  a  few  months  after. 
From  that  day,  there  were  Protestant  preachers  in  their 
country,  Bohemia,  where  are  till  now  remnants  of  the 
Hussites.  And  through  that  century,  Goch,  Tauler, 
Wessel,  Wesel,  and  Ruysbroek  were  laying  Protes- 
tant foundations  up  and  down  in  Germany ;    availing 


196  SAVONAROLA.        [a.  D.  1452- 1497. 

themselves  of  labors  which  "  the  brethren  of  the  Life 
in  Common,"  a  religious  order  founded  by  Gerard 
Groot,  had  begun  half  a  century  before. 

The  invention  of  printing,  in  the  middle  of  that  cen- 
tury, made  it  impossible  ever  to  stifle  free  inquiiy 
again,  and  their  victory  became  sure. 

NOTE  TO  CHAPTER  XVIII. 

I  am  sorry  to  say  that  Mr.  S.  Eliot's  little  volume,  Passages 
from  the  History  of  Liberty,  of  which  the  life  of  Wickliffe  is  the 
longest,  is  very  rare.     Ticknor  &  Co.     Boston.     1846. 

Lebas's  Life  of  Wickliffe.     Hai-pers'  Theol.  Library,  Vol.  I. 

Wickliffe  and  his  Times.  By  Dr.  Pond.  Am.  S.  S.  Union. 
1841. 

I  have  not  met  with  any  life  of  Huss  reprinted  in  America. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

SAVONAROLA. 

In  the  year  1445,  Pope  Clement  issued  a  set  of  in- 
dulgences for  sins,  which  were  sold  everywhere  up  and 
down  Europe.  He  was  not  the  first  who  had  done  this, 
for  revenue  to  the  Holy  See  ;  but  he  is  the  first  who 
used  the  phrase,  "  I  forbid  the  angels  in  heaven  to 
prohibit  the  passage  into  heaven "  of  the  bearer. 
Seven  years  after  this  daring  assumption,  there  was 
born  one  of  those  who  was  first  loudly  to  oppose  it. 
While  Wicklifie  was  beginning  to  preach,  when  Huss 
was  yet  a  boy,  Girolamo  Savonarola  was  born  in  Fer- 


A.  D.  1452  -  1497.]   LETTER  TO  HIS  FATHER.        J  97 

rara.  He  was  educated  with  extreme  care,  by  a  father 
worthy  of  such  a  son,  and  who  loved  him  tenderly.  At 
manhood,  he  determined  to  become  a  Dominican  monk. 
Of  the  origin  of  the  Dominicans  we  have  spoken. 

As  things  were  at  that  time,  the  life  of  a  Dominican 
monk  seemed  to  be  the  fittest  position  for  a  man  of 
zeal  and  of  eloquence,  resolved  on  self-conquest  and 
on  the  propagation  of  his  own  convictions.  There 
are  reasons,  too,  for  supposing  that  a  disappointment 
in  love,  which  he  experienced  in  his  twentieth  year, 
had  much  to  do  with  the  determination  he  then  adopted 
of  consecrating  himself  "to  Christ  and  to  the  Church." 
Family  affection  alone  contended  for  a  while  in  the 
breast  of  the  youth  with  the  desire  to  become  a  "  sol- 
dier of  Christ."  The  struggle  was  long  and  painful. 
But  the  "  sweet  love  of  Jesus  "  triumphed,  and  Savo- 
narola left  his  home  in  1475,  being  then  twenty-three 
years  of  age,  for  a  Dominican  monastery  at  Bologna. 
He  went  away  secretly,  for,  as  he  writes  to  his  father, 
"  Such  was  my  distress  at  quitting  you,  that  I  verily 
believe,  if  I  had  uttered  it,  I  should  have  broken  my 
heart  at  leaving  you ;  nay,  I  might  have  changed  my 
purpose  and  resolution.  But  though  I  could  not  tell 
you,  I  left  behind  the  books  which  are  propped  up 
against  the  window  writings  which  give  you  an  ac- 
count of  my  proceedings.  Dear  father,  then,  do  not 
weep,  nor  increase  my  grief;  grief  not  for  what  I  have 
done  (for  I  would  not  revoke  that  to  become  greater 
than  the  Coesar),  but  because  I  am  a  man,  as  you  know, 
and  the  sense  resists  reason,  and  I  must  resist  the  Devil 
that  he  may  not  conquer  me,  particularly  when  I  think 


198  SAVONAROLA.        [a.  D.  1452- 1497. 

of  you.  Soon  will  these  present  days  pass,  and  we 
may  be  consoled,  I  hope,  by  grace  here,  and  by  glory 
hereafter.  Nothing  now  remains,  but  that  I  beg  you  \o 
console  with  fortitude  my  mother,  of  whom  I  beseech 
it  that  she  will  bless  me,  and  I  will  ever  pray  for  both 
of  you." 

We  must  feel  that  such  a  man  was  worthy  to  have 
received  the  benediction  pronounced  by  Christ  upon 
those  who  were  able  to  leave  father  and  mother  for  his 
sake. 

In  the  same  beautiful  letter  Savonarola  states  as  his 
reason  for  becoming  a  monk,  "  the  great  wretched- 
ness of  the  world,  the  iniquity  of  men,  the  theft,  the  un- 
cleanness,  the  violence,  the  idolatry,  into  which  the  age 
has  fallen,  so  that  one  can  no  longer  find  a  righteous 
man."  This  horror  at  the  world's  iniquities,  this  desire 
to  flee  from  them  and  be  at  rest,  was  natural  to  a  fresh 
and  holy  soul,  on  its  first  contact  with  the  mingled  reali- 
ties of  life. 

For  many  years  Savonarola  remained  in  his  convent, 
leading  a  humble,  studious,  and  thoughtful  life.  But 
he  found,  alas !  that  the  world  within  the  convent  was 
hardly  less  foreign  to  his  soul  than  the  world  without. 
A  more  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  clergy  indis- 
posed him  more  than  ever  to  receive  ordination  at  their 
hands.  "Would  you  have  your  son  a  wicked  man," 
he  used  to  say,  "  make  him  a  priest !  O,  how  much 
poison  will  he  swallow ! "  The  ceremonial  of  the 
Church,  flattering  the  senses  and  subjugating  the  soul, 
the  pomp  of  her  offices,  and  her  hierarchy,  disgusted 
him.     "  The  prelates,"  he  said,  "  live  like  pagans  !  " 


A.  ».  1452  -  1497.]   A  DULL  PEEACHER.  199 

"1  find  no  gospel  commanding  us  to  keep  in  the 
churches  crosses  of  gold  and  silver,  but  I  find  this : 
/  was  an  hungered^  and  ye  gave  me  no  meat ;  I  was 
aihirst^  and  ye  gave  me  no  drink.^'' 

In  1475,  he  wrote  an  Italian  poem,  "  On  the  Ruin  of 
the  Church,"  which  well  expresses  his  state  of  mind. 
"  Luxury,"  he  says,  "  is  the  popular  philosophy. 
Rome,  polluted  with  all  vices,  rushes  on  to  a  second 
fall.  But  to  denounce  her  is  but  to  excite  fruitless 
enmity.  Nothing  remains,  but  silently  to  sorrow,  and  to 
holdfast  the  liope  of  a  better  future  y 

So  in  silence  he  sorrowed  and  cherished  his  hope  by 
meditating  on  the  words  and  prophecies  of  great  men ; 
of  Aquinas,  of  Augustine,  —  whom  he  passionately  loved 
and  revered,  as  Luther  did,  —  of  the  moderate  but  ear- 
nest Cassian,  and  above  all,  of  the  Scriptures,  New  and 
Old,  At  last  he  resolved  to  take  orders,  hoping  to  effect 
a  reform  in  the  priestly  office  itself.  In  1483  (the  year 
of  Luther's  birth),  he  appeared  for  the  first  time  in  the 
pulpit  at  Florence,  to  preach  the  sermons  in  Lent. 
Much  had  been  expected  of  him.  But  most  grievous 
was  his  failure  !  The  student  and  the  thinker  had  been 
perfected  at  the  expense  of  the  orator.  Day  after  day 
the  audiences  diminished,  till  only  twenty-five  women 
and  boys  were  left !  Savonarola,  however,  was  too 
sensible  not  to  understand  this.  "  I  had,"  he  says, 
"  neither  voice,  lungs,  nor  style.  My  preaching  dis- 
gusted every  body.  I  could  not  have  moved  a  chick- 
en !  "  Ere  long,  this  droning  monk  was  to  sway  whole 
states  by  his  eloquence,  and  to  become  the  Demos- 
thenes of  the  Italian  Athens  !     His  time  came  at  last. 


200  SAVONAROLA.      [a.  D.  1452- 1497. 

Roused  by  the  crimes  of  the  infamous  Pope  Inno- 
cent the  Eighth,  he  preached  in  1485  in  Brescia,  on 
the  Apocalypse.  The  flood-gates  were  opened.  The 
preacher  poured  forth  a  tide  of  burning  speech,  which 
kindled  every  heart  before  him.  From  the  meanest 
monsignore,  who  had  bought  his  petty  office,  up  to  the 
Pope,  who  bartered  all  the  blessings  and  cursings  of 
"  God's  Vicegerent  "  for  gold,  none  escaped  his  scath- 
ing invective.  "  The  chastity  of  the  cloister  is  mur- 
dered. The  princes  openly  tyrannize.  Their  subjects 
and  their  priests  encourage  them  in  every  wickedness 
and  sacrilege.  The  Popes  have  shamefully  and  cun- 
ningly bought  the  highest  dignity,  and  then,  when  seated 
in  Peter's  holy  chair,  abandon  themselves  to  a  shame- 
fully voluptuous  life,  and  an  insatiable  avarice.  The 
cardinals  and  bishops  follow  their  example.  But  after 
the  human  race  has  abused  for  so  many  centuries 
the  long-suffering  of  God,  then  at  last  God's  justice  ap- 
pears, demanding  that  the  rulers  who  with  base  exam- 
ples corrupt  the  rest  shall  be  brought  to  chastisement, 
and  that  the  people  of  Asia  or  of  Africa,  now  dwellers 
in  darkness,  should  receive  the  light !  " 

None  other  dared  preach  in  this  style.  The  people 
hailed  the  monk  of  Bologna  as  a  prophet  of  God.  Sa- 
vonarola believed  himself  to.be  moved  by  an  inward 
impulse,  and  guided  by  an  inward  illumination  from 
Heaven  ;  and,  if  he  is  a  prophet  who  feels  that  God 
himself  now  orders  what  he  says,  —  who  is  wiioUy  pos- 
sessed by  imperious  moral  convictions,  and  governed 
by  an  absolute  religious  faith,  —  Savonarola  was  truly 
a  prophet.     It  does  not  detract  from  his  claim,  to  ad- 


A.  D.  1452-1497.]      FOND  OF  CHILDREN.  201 

mit  that  he  foretold  events  which  never  came  to  pass, 
and  maintained  doctrines  in  philosophy  and  theology 
which  the  enlightened  reason  of  men  now  reject  as 
false. 

Savonarola  was  not  carried  away  by  this  sudden  re- 
vulsion in  his  favor.  In  1489,  he  was  elected  prior  of 
the  monastery  of  San  Marco  at  Florence.  That  city 
was  then  afflicted  with  a  tyranny  of  gentlemen.  The 
rich  family  of  the  Medici  had  monopolized  the  power 
of  the  state,  and  though  their  influence  was  indeed 
favorable  to  the  fine  arts,  which  were  advancing  with 
an  energy  derived  from  a  higher  source,  it  was  most 
fatal  to  the  vigor  and  true  prosperity  of  the  state.  It 
was  the  aim  of  Lorenzo,  so  much  eulogized,  and  in- 
deed not  unworthily,  to  surround  himself  with  a  circle 
of  dilettanti^  and  to  convert  the  republic  into  an  agree- 
able despotism.     He  was  but  too  successful. 

But  Savonarola  paid  no  deference  to  him.  Lorenzo, 
a  wily  and  intelligent  man  of  the  world,  was  little  moved 
by  this,  and  sought  the  preacher's  acquaintance,  in  the 
hope  of  attaching  him  to  his  cause.  But  in  vain.  And 
when  the  Duke  sent  gifts  to  the  inaccessible  monk,  the 
latter  only  said  from  his  pulpit,  "  The  good  dog  barks 
to  defend  his  master's  house,  and  if  a  robber  offers  him 
a  bone  he  pushes  it  aside  and  barks  still  !  "  A  very 
unsavory  comparison  ! 

While  thus  bearing  witness  to  the  truth  that  was  in 
him,  he  did  not  neglect  self-culture.  He  continued  his 
studies,  and  sought  wisdom  wherever  he  had  light  to  see 
it.  He  was  especially  fond  of  conversing  on  religious 
subjects  with  the  young.     "  God  oftentimes  speaks  his 


20*^  SAVONAROLA.      [a.  d.  1452  -  1497. 

revelations  by  these  simple  minds,"  he  said,  "  as  by- 
pure  vessels  of  his  Holy  Spirit."  This  trait  confirms 
his  claim  to  a  place  among  the  higher  intelligences  of 
our  race. 

Of  course  Savonarola  could  not  long  pursue  the 
course  he  had  marked  out  for  himself,  without  drawing 
around  him  a  body  of  adherents.  These  soon  became 
formidable  in  numbers  and  in  character,  and  more  for- 
midable in  zeal.  They  adopted  the  name  of  Brethren, 
or  Mourners.  The  party  of  the  Medici  sided  with  these 
in  all  cases  of  contests  between  them  and  the  third  civic 
faction,  denominated  the  Compagnacci,  consisting  chief- 
ly of  companies  of  young  nobles  jealous  of  the  supreme 
influence  of  the  house  of  Medici,  and  yet  most  hostile 
to  the  pietism  and  scrupulous  morality  of  Savonarola 
and  his  friends. 

The  materials  were  thus  prepared  for  a  civic  com- 
motion, and  all  parties  awaited  only  the  death  of  Lo- 
renzo to  commence  their  conflict.  This  event  occurred 
in  1491.  Lorenzo  had  lived  long  enough  to  do  justice 
to  the  intentions  and  the  character  of  his  uncompromis- 
ing opponent,  and  when  he  found  himself  dying,  he  sent 
for  one  whom  he  regarded  as  "  the  only  true  monk  he 
had  ever  seen."  Savonarola  came.  In  the  trying 
interview  which  followed,  he  insisted  that  the  prince 
should  free  Florence  from  usurped  authority.  Lorenzo 
refused.  Savonarola  insisted.  Lorenzo  was  firm.  And 
Savonarola  refused  to  grant  him  absolution.  Lorenzo 
may  have  best  judged  the  people  of  Florence.  But 
Savonarola  thought  differently.  We  cannot  but  com- 
mend the  sincerity,  whatever  we  may  think  of  the  char- 
ity, which  he  displayed  on  this  trying  occasion. 


A.  D.  1452-1497.]      THE  POPE  RENOUNCED.  203 

Strange  scenes  of  bloodshed  followed.  The  kmg 
of  France  seized  the  city,  and  was  obliged  to  leave  it. 
Savonarola  became  its  lawgiver  and  ruler.  He  pub- 
lished its  constitution,  impracticable  indeed,  unless,  as 
he  expected,  God  would  turn  the  hearts  of  the  people ; 
but  full  of  maxims  of  wisdom.  It  recognized  Christ  as 
the  Sovereign  of  the  city.  It  proposed  to  make  Flor- 
ence purely  a  religious  commonwealth.*  The  Pope 
was  roused  by  his  reforms.  He  exhausted  flattery, 
promises,  and  bribes  upon  him.  Savonarola  preached 
more  boldly  than  ever.  Things  were  drawing  to  a  crisis. 
In  1497,  he  addressed  letters  to  the  princes  of  Europe 
calling  for  a  general  council.  In  these,  he  used  this 
language  :  "  I  declare  to  you,  by  the  authority  of  God's 
word,  that  this  Alexander  the  Sixth  is  no  Pope,  on  ac- 
count of  his  simony,  his  public  vices,  and  his  secret  and 
scandalous  crimes.  He  is  no  Christian  !  "  This  was  a 
declaration  of  war.  The  Pope  followed  it  at  once  with 
all  the  craft  which  has  made  the  name  of  Borgia  terri- 
ble. At  last,  in  March,  1498,  he  succeeded  so  far  that 
the  Signory  of  Florence  was  found  to  contain  a  major- 
ity of  three  unfavorable  to  Savonarola.  This  was  the 
knell  of  his  coming  doom.  On  the  17th  of  that  month 
a  command  was  sent  to  him  to  forbear  preaching.  On 
the  18th,  he  appeared  for  the  last  time  in  the  pulpit. 
Never  had  he  spoken  so  fearlessly.  "  From  the  Pope 
I  turn  to  the  heavenly  Pope,  Christ  Jesus  ! "      "  This 


*  Copies  on  parchment  of  this  curious  document,  which  offers 
an  interesting  parallel  with  the  Pilgrims'  constitution,  drawn  up  in 
the  Mayflower,  still  exists. 


204  SAVONAROLA,      [a.  d.  1452-1497. 

power  of  the  present  Church  is  a  hellish  power  of  Sa- 
tan ! "  Rome  could  bear  no  more.  And  her  agents, 
zealous  in  her  service,  before  proceeding  to  extremities, 
prepared  for  Savonarola  a  humiliation  tenfold  worse 
than  death.  A  foolish  disciple  of  his,  one  Domenico  da 
Pescia,  overwarm  in  confident  ardor,  had  incautiously- 
accepted  the  challenge  of  a  crafty  Franciscan  friar  to 
undergo  the  ordeal  of  fire  in  vindication  of  his  mas- 
ter's claims  to  inspiration.  The  multitude  rejoiced  in 
the  prospect  of  this  barbarous  spectacle,  while  crowds 
of  fanatics  on  either  side  were  prepared  to  enter  the 
lists.  Savonarola  unquestionably  regretted  the  rashness 
of  his  advocate,  and  condemned  the  whole  proceeding 
as  absurd  and  wicked  ;  but  he  allowed  himself  to  be 
drawn  into  giving  his  assent  to  the  trial.  When,  after 
many  delays,  the  arrangements  were  completed,  the 
representatives  of  the  two  parties  appeared  in  the  Pi- 
azza. The  pile  had  been  carefully  prepared,  and  the 
multitude  awaited,  with  shuddering,  the  awful  spectacle. 
But  a  controversy  here  arose,  first  about  the  dresses 
of  the  Dominicans  of  San  Marco,  which  their  antago- 
nists pretended  to  believe  enchanted  ;  and  then  about  a 
crucifix  which  Domenico  da  Pescia  insisted  on  carrying 
through  the  flames.  Before  this  point  could  be  settled, 
a  furious  storm  of  rain  and  hail  coming  up  deluged  the 
pile,  and  put  an  end  to  the  experiment.  Then  appeared 
the  fickleness  of  the  mob.  They  pursued  Savonarola 
to  his  convent.  In  attack  after  attack  they  stormed  it, 
and  captured  him.  Plis  trial  for  heresy  was  ordered. 
He  was  tortured  by  the  Inquisitors.  In  the  anguish  of 
his  suffering  they  wrung  from  him  some  ejaculations, 


A.  D.  1452  -  1497.]   BURNT  AT  THE  STAKE.  205 

which  they  afterwards  pretended  were  a  recantation. 
But  whenever  his  senses  returned,  he  declared  himself 
steadfast  to  his  old  convictions.  And  at  last  they  gave 
the  lie  to  their  own  declarations  by  condemning  him  to 
be  burned  as  an  incorrigible  heretic. 

When  the  fatal  day  at  last  arrived,  and  he  was  brought 
face  to  face  with  death,  his  behavior  was  that  of  a  true 
confessor.  He  prayed  with  his  companions,  exhorted 
them  to  courage  and  faith,  —  bore  with  meekness  the 
taunts  of  his  enemies,  —  submitted  calmly  to  the  strip- 
ping off  from  his  shoulders  the  outward  insignia  of  that 
priestly  office  which  a  higher  than  the  Pope  had  now 
laid  upon  him,  and  when  the  bishop,  taking  him  by  the 
hand,  pronounced  his  sentence,  "  I  separate  thee  from 
the  Church  Triumphant,"  he  firmly  replied,  "  Nay, 
from  the  Church  Militant^  —  from  the  Church  Tri- 
umphant thou  canst  not  separate  me  !  " 

The  same  resolved  temper  was  manifested  by  him  at 
the  stake.  We  read  that  Cranmer,  when  brought  to 
suffer  the  same  fearful  fate,  thrust  his  right  hand  first 
into  the  flames,  that  it  might  thus  expiate  the  crime  of 
his  previous  recantation.  A  more  sublime  incident  is 
recorded  of  Savonarola,  —  that,  while  the  flames  were 
circling  around  his  arm,  his  hand  was  seen  still  raised, 
with  the  fingers  extended  in  the  form  appropriate  to  the 
Latin  benediction  over  the  heads  of  the  fickle  multitude, 
whose  shouts  of  rage  and  insulting  jeers  were  the  re- 
quiem of  the  soul  that  had  so  labored  for  their  sake. 

The  ashes  of  the  martyr  were  gathered  up  by  the  ex- 
ecutioner, and  flung  into  the  yellow  waters  of  the  Arno. 
They  went  where  WicklifTe's  and  Huss's  had  gone,  — 

NO.   VIII.  18 


206  CHRISTIAN    FINE    ARTS    AND    EMBLEMS. 

and  the  lesson  is  the  same.  The  flame  which  Savona- 
rola had  lighted  —  a  flame  caught  by  him  from  the 
most  sacred  altars  of  Knowledge,  Holiness,  and  Truth 
—  seemed  indeed  to  be  stifled  in  Italy.  But  it  spread 
into  other  lands,  and  we  who  enjoy  so  large  a  measure 
of  freedom,  religious  and  civil,  should  remember  with 
grateful  hearts  those  gifted  men  whose  genius  and 
whose  faith  made  Italy  the  morning  star  of  modern 
civilization.  Among  them  all,  no  one  has  left  us  such 
plain  traces  of  his  personal  character  and  influence  as 
Girolamo  Savonarola.  In  honoring  him,  we  honor  his 
predecessors,  his  companions,  and  his  friends. 

NOTE    TO    CHAPTER  XIX. 

For  the  facts  embraced  in  this  life  of  Savonarola,  we  are  mainly 
indebted  to  two  sources,  Heraud's  Life  of  Savonarola,  and  Rudel- 
bach's  "  Savonarola  und  seine  Zeit."     Hamburg,  1835. 

Interesting  notices  of  the  Italian  are  also  to  be  found  in  Des 
Comines,  Machiavelli  (who  speaks  of  his  character  as  most  truly 
venerable  and  holy),  Guicciardini,  and  Bayle. 

Roscoe's  account  of  him  is  exceedingly  shallow,  and  worthless. 

There  is  an  agreeable  sketch  in  Mr.  Eliot's  book,  already  re- 
ferred to. 


CHAPTER    XX. 

CHRISTIAN    FINE   ARTS   AND   EMBLEMS. 

The  invention  of  printing  was  made  within  five  and 
twenty  years  of  Huss's  death.  It  put  an  end  for  ever, 
as  we  have  said,  to  the  pretence  of  exact  uniformity  in 


PRINTING   INVENTED.  207 

the  religious  faith  of  Christendom.  Men  will  differ  in 
their  feelings  and  statements  of  religious  truth,  as  widely 
as  they  differ  in  affections,  in  mental  gifts,  or  in  per- 
son. And  after  this  great  invention  scattered  every- 
where the  knowledge  of  this  variety  of  opinion,  always 
existing  among  men,  any  pretence  that  one  set  for- 
mula of  belief  could  ever  rule  them  all,  became  every 
day  more  absurd  and  more. 

This  invention  led  also,  of  course,  to  a  different  intel- 
lectual and  moral  condition  of  the  great  mass  of  the 
people.  It  had  been  idle  for  them  to  learn  to  read  while 
books  were  as  dear  as  manuscripts  must  be.  All  men 
but  the  richest  had  been  obliged  till  now  to  receive  all 
their  religious  or  mental  instruction  from  others'  lips, 
because  they  had  no  books  from  which  to  learn,  and  so 
no  power  to  read  books.  This  condition  has  changed. 
As  fast  as  men  have  been  able  to  obtain  books,  the  abil- 
ity and  the  desire  to  use  them  have  extended  as  far. 

We  take  this  period,  then,  to  speak  in  a  few  words  of 
a  great  subject,  which  in  so  few  words  can  be  hardly 
touched  upon.  This  is  the  Fine  Arts  and  Emblems  of 
Christianity.  The  emblematic  representations  which 
could  be  carved  and  painted,  the  pictures  with  which 
the  churches  were  decorated,  or  which  passed  as  minia- 
tures from  hand  to  hand,  and  the  hymns  and  chants 
of  the  Church,  had  made,  till  the  invention  of  printing, 
almost  the  whole  of  the  instruction  on  religion  which 
the  unlearned  could  receive. 

The  earliest  poetry  of  Christianity  is  in  the  words  of 
the  triumphal  songs  of  Mary  and  of  Zacharias,  and  of 
the  angels,  of  Simeon,  and  Anna  at  the  time  of  Jesus's 


208  CHRISTIAN    FINE    ARTS    AND    EMBLEMS. 

birth.  They  have  been,  very  naturally,  kept  m  the 
liturgies  and  hymn-books  of  the  Church.  The  poet  of 
the  Gospels,  St.  Luke,  records  them  all.  Passing  from 
them,  the  Hymn  of  the  Last  Supper,  which  they  sang 
before  they  went  out  to  the  Mount  of  Olives,  is  the 
first  strictly  Christian  hymn  spoken  of  in  Christian  his- 
tory. But,  immediately  after,  the  Acts  and  the  Epistles 
of  the  infant  Christian  brotherhood  show  how  constant- 
ly music  made  part  of  their  united  worshio.  There  is 
the  record  that,  in  the  inner  prison  at  Philippi,  with 
their  feet  in  the  stocks,  Paul  and  Silas  sang  praises  unto 
God,  and  the  prisoners  heard  them.  The  pleasant  sug- 
gestion has  been  made,  that  among  those  midnight  songs 
of  theirs  may  have  been  the  triumphant  Hundredth 
Psalm,  sung  to  the  same  air  of  Old  Hundred  which  lives 
to  this  day.  This  is  certain,  that  in  the  earliest  choral 
books  of  Pope  Gregory,  now  thirteen  centuries  old,  that 
air  exists.  Luther  adapted  it  from  them.  And  there 
is  nothing  to  prevent  us  from  thinking  that  it  came  down 
from  the  Apostles'  times. 

Of  the  words  of  the  Apostolic  hymns,  however,  we 
have  but  a  £ew  traces.  The  Psalms  of  David  were  used 
in  all  the  early  churches.  In  the  outset  of  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews,  there  is  a  passage  compiled  from  sev- 
eral Psalms,  which  has  the  aspect  of  a  hymn,  familiar, 
in  tliat  form,  to  those  to  whom  the  Epistle  is  written :  — 

"And  thou,  Lord,  in  the  beginning 
Hast  laid  the  foundation  of  the  earth  ; 
And  the  heavens  are  the  works  of  thine  hands  : 
They  shall  perish  ;  but  thou  remainest. 
And  they  all  shall  wax  old  as  doth  a  garment , 


EARLY    HYMNS.  209 


And  as  a  vesture  shalt  thou  fold  them  up, 
And  they  shall  be  changed  : 
But  thou  art  the  same, 
And  thy  years  shall  not  fail." 

This  is  a  compilation  from  the  passages  of  Hebrew 
poetry;  but  the  two  following  passages  are  found,  in 
the  original,  to  be  in  Greek  verse.  They  are  not  taken 
from  the  Hebrew,  and  we  may  regard  them,  therefore, 
as  our  oldest  Christian  hymns. 

From  Ephesians  v.  14  :  — 

"Awake,  thou  that  sleepest, 

And  rise  from  the  dead, 

And  Christ  shall  give  thee  life." 

From  1  Tim.  iii.  16*:  ~ 

"  He  who  was  manifest  in  the  flesh. 
Was  justified  in  the  spirit, 
Was  seen  of  angels, 
Was  preached  to  the  heathen, 
Was  believed  in  the  world, 
Was  received  into  glory !  " 

At  the  close  of  the  fourth  chapter  of  this  book  there 
is  a  version  of  the  earliest  Christian  hymn  now  pre- 
served, of  a  later  date  than  these.  From  that  time 
there  are  hymns  of  every  century, —  fragments  from 
some  of  which  are  in  modern  hymns  in  almost  all  the 
hymn-books  now  in  use. 

In  Clement's  hymn,  there  are  many  figures  used 
which  have  disappeared  from  sacred  poetry,  —  scarce- 
ly any,  however,  which  are  not  taken  from  the  Scrip- 
tures. It  was,  of  course,  by  a  ready  transition,  that 
these  were  expressed  in  sculpture  on  tombs,  or  in  paint- 
18* 


210  CHRISTIAN    FINE   ARTS    AND    EMBLEMS. 

ing.  The  ingenuity  of  the  monks  for  a  thousand  years 
expended  itself  on  discovering  natural  symbols  to  ex- 
press religious  truth.  And  their  number  is  inexhausti- 
ble, —  for  it  is  the  same  God  who  makes  the  world  of 
nature  and  who  gives  to  us  our  religious  faith.  Every 
new  poet,  of  course,  gives  us  an  addition  to  those  we 
have  had  before.     That  is  a  poet's  duty. 

In  our  limited  space  it  is  impossible  to  name  these 
with  any  approach  to  their  great  number  and  variety. 
A  few  instances  of  a  few  forms  are  all  that  we  have 
space  for. 

The  just  fear  of  idolatry  long  prevented  any  attempt 
to  represent  God.  The  earliest  .symbol  of  the  Father 
is  an  immense  hand  proceeding  from  a  cloud,  —  or  a 
ray  of  light  from  heaven.  It  was  meant  to  imply  that 
we  only  see  Him  in  his  works,  or  in  his  light  shed  upon 
the  world.  Later  times  more  boldly  represent,  first,  the 
face  of  God  resting  on  a  cloud,  then  the  bust,  and 
later  yet,  the  whole  figure.  This  was  at  first  identical 
with  that  of  the  Son.  But  at  the  close  of  the  fourteenth 
century  the  Father  is  represented  older  than  the  Son, 
—  sometimes  as  if  an  older  brother,  then  as  an  old 
man,  —  while  the  Son  is  in  mature  life,  and  the  Spirit 
a  youth.  As  time  passed  on,  the  fine  arts  again  with- 
drew from  the  effort  to  represent  the  incomprehensible, 
and  inscribed  His  name,  Jehovah,  in  a  triangle  repre- 
senting the  Trinity,  surrounded  with  rays  of  glory. 

Of  Jesus,  the  representations  are  very  numerous. 
There  are  four  pictures,  which  claim,  wholly  untruly,  to 
be  painted  from  him  by  St.  Luke.  An  old  fable  said, 
that,  as  he  walked  to  the  cross,  he  took  a  handkerchief 


PICTURES    OF   JESUS.  211 

from  some  by-stander  and  wiped  his  face  ;  that  the  cloth 
miraculously  assumed  the  representation  of  his  face, 
and  was  sent  to  the  king  of  Edessa,  where  it  wrought 
many  miracles.  The  early  Church,  after  those  who  re- 
membered Christ  had  died,  maintained  the  notion,  from 
some  literal  interpretations  of  Jewish  poetry,  that  his  per- 
son was  mean  and  unseemly.  But  Jerome,  Augustine, 
Chrysostom,  and  Ambrose,  in  the  time  of  Constantino 
and  after,  insist  that  he  was  of  majestic  and  engaging 
appearance.  "  He  was  beautiful,"  says  Augustine, 
"  on  his  mother's  bosom,  beautiful  in  his  parents'  arms, 
beautiful  upon  the  cross,  beautiful  in  the  sepulchre. 

The  earliest  images  of  Jesus  are  referred  to  the 
Gnostic  sects.  One  of  these  is  a  medal  in  metal,  with 
a  head  of  Christ,  representing  his  hair  parted  over  the 
forehead,  covering  the  ears,  and  falling  over  the  shoul- 
ders ;  the  face  is  long,  the  beard  short  and  thin.  It 
bears  the  name  Jesus,  and  the  inscription,  "  The  Mes- 
siah comes,  and  lives,  being  made  the  Light  of  men."* 
It  is  probably  the  earliest  representation  of  him,  but  its 
history  cannot  be  traced  certainly  farther  back  than 
the  fifth  or  sixth  century.  In  Rome,  there  are  early 
pictures  and  statues,  some  referred  to  the  fourth  cen- 
tury, agreeing  in  the  representation  of  him ;  which 
gives  an  oval  countenance,  slightly  lengthened,  and  a 
grave,  soft,  and  melancholy  expression. 

Symbols,  or  emblems,  from  such  poetry  as  we  have 


*  There  are  more  than  one  of  these  medals  extant.  We  have 
seen  a  seal,  taken  from  an  electrotype  moulded  from  one  of  them, 
which  is  used  as  the  church  seal  of  one  of  our  churches 


212  CHRISTIAN    FINE    ARTS    AND   EMBLEMS. 

alluded  to,  are  of  course  numerous.  Every  parable 
which  Jesus  used  regarding  himself  supplies  them. 

The  cross  is  drawn  in  every  possible  way.  Its  re- 
semblance to  the  lines  of  longitude  and  latitude  cross- 
ing on  a  map,  is  made  to  show  that  it  is  for  the  blessing 
of  all,  —  north,  south,  east,  and  west. 

It  is  the  figure  of  a  man  swimming ;  —  so  it  floats  the 
sinking  Christian  over  his  Jordan. 

It  is  the  mast  and  yard  of  a  ship  ;  —  and  here  comes 
the  same  application. 

It  is  the  shape  of  the  ancient  standard,  —  and  be- 
comes a  sign  of  victory. 

It  is  the  shape  of  a  soaring  bird  ;  —  so  it  lifts  us  to 
heaven. 

Many  centuries  elapsed  before  any  figure  of  the  Sav- 
iour was  wrought  upon  it. 

Other  symbols  of  him  were  the  lamb,  from  the 
New  Testament  language;  —  the  shepherd,  which  was 
wrought,  in  the  second  century,  on  a  communion  cup  ;  — 
the  fish,  because  its  Greek  name,  Ix^vs,  is  made  from 
the  initial  letters  of  'Irjaovs  Xpio-Tos  Oeov  Ylbs  ^coTfjp,  "  Je- 
sus Christ,  the  Saviour,  Son  of  God."  In  the  Armenian 
convent  near  Venice  is  the  representation  of  a  pelican, 
who  feeds  her  young  with  her  own  blood,  a  beautiful 
emblem  of  the  Saviour's  love. 

The  dove  descending  was  the  most  frequent  repre- 
sentation of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Tongues  of  fire  are  used 
to  renew  the  memory  of  Pentecost.  White  robes  at 
Whitsunday,  the  anniversary  of  Pentecost,  gave  the 
name  to  that  day  ;  they  were  worn  as  emblems  of  pu- 
rity by  those  about  to  be  confirmed  in  the  Catholic  or 
English  or  Lutheran  rituals. 


THE   "GLORY."  213 

An  anchor  denotes  faith^  —  as  in  Hebrews  vi.  19. 

The  cock  is  Christian  vigilance. 

The  stag  is  the  hart  who  thirsteth  for  the  water- 
brooks. 

The  horse  is  the  emblem  of  haste  for  salvation. 

The  lion  is  Christian  strength ;  the  hare,  the  Christian 
fleeing  from  his  enemies. 

The  phoenix  indicated  the  resurrection. 

On  Easter  morning,  the  favorite  symbol  is  an  egg. 
For  to  the  eye  it  is  cold  and  dead  as  a  stone  ;  —  so  was 
the  sealed  tomb  ;  — :  but  in  God's  time  life  will  break 
it  open,  and  the  living  bird  comes  forth  from  its  stony 
sepulchre.  Beautiful  porcelain  eggs,  with  paintings 
illustrating  the  life  or  death  of  Christ,  are  Easter  gifts 
in  Catholic  countries.  The  birth  of  the  butterfly  from 
the  cocoon  is  not  so  much  a  symbol  of  the  resurrection, 
as  an  instance  of  it  where  we  see  both  worlds  of  the 
creature's  life. 

The  passion-flower  has  been  so  named  from  very 
early  times.  Its  tendrils  are  the  cords  which  bound 
Jesus.  Its  deeply  cut  leaves  show  his  open  palm.  Its 
fine  petals,  tinged  with  crimson,  are  the  bloody  crown 
of  thorns,  and  the  hammer  and  the  nails  may  be  found 
in  its  pistils  and  stamens. 

The  palm  has  been  always  a  Christian  tree,  since 
the  day  of  hosannas.  It  is  the  emblem  of  conquest  and 
of  immortality. 

The  glory  or  nimbus  around  sacred  heads  in  paint- 
ings was  first  used  in  the  seventh  centuiy.  It  is  now 
going  out  of  use  with  the  best  masters.  It  is  a  rim  of 
light,  sometimes  with  rays  shooting  from  it,  supported 
by  a  cross,  radiating  from  the  head  which  bears  it. 


214  CHRISTIAN    FINE    ARTS    AND    EMBLEMS. 

The  vestments  put  upon  the  Catholic  priest,  who,  rep* 
resenting  Jesus,  performs  the  sacrifice  of  the  Mass, 
are, —  1st,  the  Amice,  which  represents  the  rag  with 
which  the  Jews  muffled  his  face  when  they  bade  him 
prophesy  who  struck  him  ;  2d,  the  Alb,  which  is  the 
white  garment  in  which  Herod  invested  him  ;  3d,  the 
Girdle,  Maniple,  and  Stole,  which  represent  the  cords 
with  which  he  was  bound  ;  4th,  the  Chasuble  or  outward 
vestment,  which  represents  the  purple  robe.  On  the 
back  of  this  a  cross  is  embroidered,  to  represent  that 
which  he  bore.  The  priest's  tonsure  is  the  representa- 
tion of  the  crown  of  thorns. 

The  Catholic  altars  are  made  in  the  form  of  tombs, 
in  memory  of  the  times  when  Christian  worship  was 
secretly  performed  in  old  Roman  places  of  burial. 
The  constant  light  above  the  altar  is  a  similar  memorial 
of  the  underground  worship  of  the  Catacombs. 

We  must  not  leave  this  subject  without  alluding  to 
the  Christian  remains  in  the  old  Catacombs  under 
Rome.  There  the  Christians  worshipped  when  driven 
from  the  open  air.  There  are  still  their  monuments. 
The  simplicity  and  faith  of  the  inscriptions  is  most 
pathetic.  Some  simple  Christian  symbol,  with  a  few 
words,  contrasts  with  the  elaborate  inscriptions  on  faith- 
less Roman  tombs.  "  Victorina  sleeps."  "  Agape, 
may  you  live  for  ever  !  "  "  Sweet  Faustina,  may  you 
live  in  God  ! "  Such  are  the  whole  inscriptions.  Some- 
times a  few  words  are  added:  —  "Amelia,  our  sweet- 
est daughter,  who  departed  from  the  world  when  Sev- 
erus  and  Quintus  were  consuls.  She  lived  fifteen 
years  and  four  months."  The  earliest  of  these  yet 
deciphered  is  of  the  year  98. 


A.  D.  1498-1513.]  AMERICA.  215 

The  various  festival  days  of  the  Church  would  prop- 
erly be  spoken  of  here,  but  we  have  already  outrun  the 
limits  of  a  chapter.  The  Christian  arts  of  design 
achieved  their  highest  triumphs  in  the  very  age  when 
the  invention  of  printing  first  opened  another  means 
for  addressing  the  truths  of  religion  to  the  people. 
Those  masters  of  Christian  art,  of  whom  some  have 
never  been  surpassed,  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Bartolomeo, 
Michel  Angelo,  Titian,  and  RafTaelle,  were  all  born 
within  a  few  years  of  each  other;  the  first  in  1452, 
the  last  in  1483. 

NOTE  TO   CHAPTER  XX. 

The  articles  Painting,  or  Fine  Arts,  in  the  cyclopasdias,  cover 
ground  which  we  have  omitted  to  speak  of. 

In  the  Christian  Examiner  for  September,  1847,  is  a  very  inter- 
esting article  on  the  Catacombs. 

In  the  Examiner  for  November,  1846,  is  an  article  on  Christian 
Artistic  Representations. 


CHAPTER    XXI. 

CHRISTIANITY    IN   AMERICA. COLUMBUS.  —  BALBOA. 

We  Americans  ought  never  to  forget  that  the  discov- 
ery of  this  continent,  as  it  was  made  in  fact,  is  one  of 
Christ's  gifts  to  civilization.  The  history  of  that  discov- 
ery is  distinctly  a  part  of  Christian  history.  Columbus 
would  never  have  held  to  his  persevering  effort,  if  he 
had  not  had  the  strength  of  a  Christian's  life.      In  all 


216  coLTJMBrs.  [a.  d.  1498. 

his  letters  there  appears  Christian  motive  of  one  sort  or 
another.  And  to  the  end  of  his  Hfe  he  considered  his 
great  discoveries  as  being  most  worthy,  because  they 
were  new  accessions  to  the  kingdom  of  Christ.  This 
feeling  is  often  mixed  up  with  the  pecuhar  rehgious  no- 
tions of  the  time.  But  it  is  none  the  less  genuine. 
When  he  sailed  on  his  last  voyage,  an  old  man  who  had 
suffered  trials  which  would  have  overwhelmed  any  but 
a  Christian  adventurer,  he  had  a  hope  which  he  had 
thus  expressed  in  a  letter  to  the  king  of  Spain  :  — 

"  I  believe  that,  if  I  should  pass  under  the  equator  in 
arriving  at  this  higher  region  of  which  I  speak,  I  should 
find  there  a  milder  temperature,  and  a  diversity  in  stars 
and  in  the  waters.  Not  that  I  believe  the  highest  point 
is  navigable  whence  these  currents  flow,  nor  that  we 
can  mount  them,  because  I  am  convinced  that  there  is 
the  terrestrial  paradise,  where  no  one  can  enter  but  by 
the  will  of  God." 

He  sailed  with  this  gallant  notion  of  coming  as  near 
as  man  could  come  to  the  city  of  God.  In  this  voyage 
he  coasted  along  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  now  so  inter- 
esting to  the  world,  hoping  to  find  a  passage  into  the 
Western  Ocean.  He  satisfied  himself  that  there  was 
the  place  to  establish  the  great  city  of  America,  which 
should  be  the  central  point  of  its  new  civilization. 
And  not  far  west  of  our  new  city  of  Aspinwall,  which 
has  been  named  from  a  successful  merchant,  he  built 
his. 

And  he  gave  to  his  the  name  of  Bethlehem  ;  —  for  he 
hoped  that  there  the  Christianity  of  the  New  World  was 
to  be  born. 


A.  D.  1498.]  HIS  VISION.  217 

In  this  little  city  he  suffered  every  sort  of  distress. 
Mutiny,  sickness,  and  cruel  tidings  from  home  wore 
upon  his  spirits.  He  was  reduced  himself  to  a  sick 
6ed.  And  there  he  had  a  vision,  he  says,  which  will 
give  some  idea  of  his  view  of  his  great  discovery :  — 

"  Wearied  and  sighing,  I  fell  into  a  slumber,  when  I 
heard  a  piteous  voice  saying  to  me,  '  O  fool,  and  slow 
to  believe  and  serve  thy  God,  who  is  the  God  of  all  ! 
What  did  he  more  for  Moses,  or  for  his  servant  David, 
than  he  has  done  for  thee  ?  From  the  time  of  thy  birth 
he  has  ever  had  thee  under  his  peculiar  care.  When 
he  saw  thee  of  a  fitting  age,  he  made  thy  name  to  re- 
sound marvellously  throughout  the  earth,  and  thou  wast 
obeyed  in  many  lands,  and  didst  acquire  honorable 
fame  amonir  Christians.  Of  the  orates  of  the  ocean 
sea,  shut  up  with  such  mighty  chains,  he  delivered  thee 
the  keys  ;  the  Indies,  those  wealthy  regions  of  the  world, 
ne  gave  thee  for  thine  own,  and  empowered  thee  to 
dispose  of  them  to  others  according  to  thy  pleasure. 
What  did  he  more  for  the  great  people  of  Israel  when 
ne  led  them  forth  from  Egypt  ?  or  for  David,  whom, 
from  being  a  shepherd,  he  made  a  king  of  Judea  ? 
Turn  !o  him,  then,  and  acknowledge  thine  error.  His 
mercy  is  infinite.  He  has  many  and  vast  inheritances 
yet  in  reserve  ;  fear  not  to  seek  them.  Thine  age  shall 
be  no  impediment  to  any  great  undertaking.  Thou 
urgest  despondingly  for  succor.  Answer!  who  has  af- 
flicted thee  so  much,  and  so  many  times  ?  God,  or  tlK3 
world  ?  The  privileges  and  promises  which  God  hath 
made  thee,  he  hath  never  broken  ;  neither  hath  he  said, 
after  havinir  received  thy  services,  that  his  menninn-  was 


218  COLUMBUS.  [a.  d.  1498. 

different,  and  to  be  understood  in  a  different  sense.  He 
performs  to  the  very  letter.  He  fulfils  all  that  he  prom- 
ises, and  with  increase.  Such  is  his  custom.  I  have 
shown  thee  what  thy  Creator  hath  done  for  thee,  and 
what  he  doeth  for  all.  The  present  is  the  reward  of  the 
toils  and  perils  thou  hast  endured  in  serving  others.' 

"I  heard  all  this,"  says  Columbus,  "as  one  almost 
dead,  and  had  no  power  to  reply  to  words  so  true,  ex- 
cepting to  weep  for  my  errors.  Whoever  it  was  that 
spake  to  me  closed  by  saying,  '  Fear  not,  Columbus, 
all  these  tribulations  are  written  in  marble,  and  are  not 
without  cause.' " 

It  was  true  that  God  had  other  worlds  for  him  to  dis- 
cover, and  other  realms  for  so  pure  a  spirit  to  travel 
in.  But  they  were  the  other  side  that  gate  of  para- 
dise, which  his  religious  fancy  thought  he  should  dis- 
cover in  his  Pacific  yoyages.  This  was  his  last  earthly 
enterprise.  The  colony,  which  had,  with  a  pride  not 
blasphemous,  been  called  Bethlehem,  failed,  —  and  the 
heart-broken  old  man  returned  to  ungrateful  Spain  to  die. 

From  a  colony  established  in  the  neighborhood,  the 
expedition  was  led  which  discovered  the  great  Pacific 
Ocean.  In  the  lovely  islands  of  that  ocean,  among  its 
simple  gentle  islanders,  some  early  navigators  thought 
Columbus's  hopes  came  true,  and  that  there  was  indeed 
the  terrestrial  paradise.  But  it  has  not  proved  so. 
And  if  any  paradise  is  to  be  there,  it  is  to  be  wrought 
out  by  Christian  civilization,  working  with  the  immense 
resources  of  that  ocean,  now  just  opening  to  Christian 
commerce.  And,  for  this,  Christian  civilization  must 
act  more  vigorously  than  it  has  yet  begun  to  do.     The 


A.  D.  1513.]  THE    OCEAN    VIEW.  219 


first  discovery  of  that  ocean  gave,  however,  beautiful 
promise  to  its  future.  It  has  proved  to  be  a  sea  where 
the  Buccaneers,  the  most  ferocious  of  pirates,  wrought 
for  centuries  their  deeds  of  bloodshed,  almost  unmolest- 
ed. It  has  been  disgraced  by  the  cruelties  of  Pizarro 
and  Almagro  in  the  first  adventures  of  Christians,  as  they 
called  themselves,  along  its  shores.  But  when  Balboa, 
truly  a  Christian  gentleman  of  his  times,  discovered  it, 
he  gave  to  it  the  Christian  name  of  the  Pacific.  And 
in  his  first  sight  of  it  he  had  a  high  religious  sense  of 
the  value  of  his  discovery. 

He  and  his  men  had  toiled  on  for  many  days,  by  a 
tedious  march,  over  the  densely  wooded  hills  through 
which  the  new  Panama  Railroad  winds  its  way.  Their 
success  is  thus  described  by  Mr.  Irving  :  — 

"  About  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning  of  September  23, 
1513,  they  emerged  from  the  thick  forests  through  which 
they  had  hitherto  struggled,  and  arrived  at  a  lofty  and 
airy  region  of  the  mountain.  The  bald  summit  alone 
remained  to  be  ascended,  and  their  Indian  guides  point- 
ed to  a  moderate  eminence,  from  which  they  said  the 
Southern  Sea  was  visible. 

"  Upon  this  Balboa  commanded  his  followers  to  halt, 
and  that  no  man  should  stir  from  his  place.  Then,  with 
a  palpitating  heart,  he  ascended  alone  the  bare  mountain- 
top.  On  reaching  the  summit,  the  long-desired  prospect 
burst  upon  his  view.  It  was  as  if  a  new  world  were 
unfolded  to  him,  separated  from  all  hitherto  known  by 
this  mighty  barrier  of  mountains.  Below  him  extend- 
ed a  vast  chaos  of  rock  and  forest,  and  green  savan- 
nas and  wandering  streams,  while  at  a   distance   the 


220  BALBOA.  [a. d.  1513. 

waters  of  the  promised  ocean  glittered  in  the  morning 
sun. 

"  At  this  glorious  prospect  Balboa  sank  upon  his  knees, 
and  poured  out  thanks  to  God  that  he  was  the  first 
European  to  whom  it  was  given  to  make  that  great  dis- 
covery. He  then  called  his  people  to  ascend.  '  Behold, 
my  friends,'  said  he,  '  that  glorious  sight  which  we 
have  so  much  desired.  Let  us  give  thanks  to  God  that 
he  has  granted  us  this  great  honor  and  advantage.  Let 
us  pray  to  him  to  guide  and  aid  us  to  conquer  the  sea 
and  land  which  we  have  discovered,  and  which  Chris- 
tian has  never  entered  to  preach  the  holy  doctrine  of 
the  Evangelists.' 

"  The  Spaniards  answered  this  speech  by  embracing 
him  and  promising  to  follow  him  to  the  death.  Among 
them  was  a  priest,  who  lifted  up  his  voice  and  chanted 
'  Te  Deum  laudamus^''  —  'We  praise  thee,  O  God.' 
The  rest,  kneeling  down,  joined  in  the  strain  with  pious 
enthusiasm  and  tears  of  joy,  and  never  did  a  more  sin- 
cere oblation  rise  to  the  Deity  from  a  sanctified  altar 
than  from  that  wild  mountain  summit." 

Too  much  cannot  be  said,  it  is  true,  of  the  cruelty  of 
those  discoverers  among  the  Spaniards,  or  other  nations, 
who  sought  the  New  World  with  no  motive  but  gold. 
But  it  is  absurd  to  speak  as  if  that  were  the  only  mo- 
tive, or  they  the  only  adventurers.  Without  Christian 
motive,  America  would  not  have  been  discovered  as  it 
was.  And  Christian  zeal  and  Christian  faith  warmed 
many  a  gallant  Catholic  missionary,  who  gave  his  life 
to  instilling  faith  in  Christ  into  the  hearts  of  the  nati\  es 
of  the  land.     A  weak,  formal  sort  of  Christianity  it  >s  as. 


A.  D.  1521.]  DIET    OF    WORMS.  221 

But  Still,  to  our  day,  the  wrecks  of  the  natives  of  those 
lands  cling  to  it.  They  take  the  Christian  name,  and 
accept  all  the  Christian  faith  which  has  been  taught  to 
them.  This  is  a  boast  which  we  cannot  yet  make  of 
the  natives  of  the  other  parts  of  America. 

NOTE   TO   CHAPTEE  XXI. 

Irving's  Life  of  Columbus. 

"         Companions  of  Columbus, 
Prescott's  Mexico. 

"  Peru. 


CHAPTER   XXII. 

MARTIN    LUTHER. 

Martin  Luther,  a  monk,  dressed  in  a  nionk's  dress, 
sat  in  an  open  wagon,  with  three  friends,  riding  into  the 
old  city  of  Worms.  It  was  the  16th  of  April,  1521. 
There  was  nothing  in  his  simple  arrangements  for  the 
journey  which  should  show  that  that  day  opened  on 
"  the  greatest  scene  in  modern  history,"  or  that  it  was 
*' the  point,  indeed,  from  which  the  whole  subsequent 
history  of  civilization  takes  its  rise."  But  it  was.  And 
he  felt  it  was. 

Luther  had  been  preaching  reform,  in  one  and 
another  way,  for  years.  Germany  was  prepared  for 
it  by  the  various  reformers  we  have  spoken  of,  by  the 
spirit  of  its  people,  and  by  countless  reformers  who  died 
without  leaving  name  or  fame  behind  them.  And  now 
19* 


222  MARTIN  LUTHEH.        [a.  D.  1521. 

the  Emperor  had  sent  for  him,  that,  at  a  great  Diet 
or  assembly  of  the  princes  of  the  German  Empire  at 
Worms,  some  end  might  be  put  to  the  excitement. 
The  Pope  had  sent  his  legate  there,  the  Cardinal  Alex- 
ander. But  he  found,  to  his  amazement,  a  universal 
antipathy  to  his  master.  Songs,  pictures,  placards,  and 
writings,  caricaturing  the  Pope  and  himself,  were  eveiy- 
where.  It  was  a  new  thing  for  a  cardinal  to  be  so 
handled. 

The  Pope  had  long  before  condemned  Luther  as  a 
heretic.  And  this  year,  on  the  28th  day  of  March,  Holy 
Thursday,  the  condemnation  had  been  in  form  con- 
firmed by  the  most  solemn  anathema  of  the  Church.  A 
vast  multitude  had  assembled  to  receive  his  blessing  in 
Rome.  The  magnificent  square  before  the  newly  built 
St.  Peter's  was  decorated  with  myrtle  and  laurel  ;  great 
wax  candles  were  burning  on  the  splendid  balcony,  and 
in  presence  of  the  concourse  was  the  consecrated  host. 
Of  a  sudden  the  sound  of  bells  is  heard,  and  the  Pope, 
in  his  chair  of  state,  is  borne  forward,  most  gorgeously 
dressed,  upon  the  balcony.  "  The  people  fall  on  their 
knees  ;  every  one  is  uncovered  ;  the  flags  are  lowered 
before  him  ;  the  troops  ground  arms,  and  there  is  sol- 
emn silence.  After  a  pause,  the  Pope  stretches  out  his 
hands,  lifts  them  to  heaven,  and  then,  making  the  sign 
of  the  cross,  lets  them  gradually  fall  towards  the  earth. 
He  repeats  these  gestures  three  times.  The  people 
cannot  hear  him,  but  the  pealing  bells  announce  every- 
where that  he  has  blessed  them.  Then  a  train  of 
priests  advanced,  each  with  a  lighted  torch.  They 
rushed  along  swinging  their  torches  wildly  and  madly 


A.  D.  1521.]  Charles's  letter.  223 

to  and  fro.  The  multitude  are  thrilled  with  awe  and 
terror  as  the  words  of  cursing  were  uttered  in  turn  :  — 

"  'We  curse  all  heretics,  —  the  Cathari,the  Patarini, 
"  the  poor  men  "  of  Lyons,  the  Arnoldists,  the  Spero- 
nists,  the  Passageni,  the  Wickliffites,  the  Hussites,  the 
Fraticelli,  and  Martin  Luther,  recently  condemned  by 
us  for  a  like  heresy,  together  with  all  his  adherents  and 
all  persons,  whoever  they  may  be,  who  aid  or  abet 
him  ;  in  like  manner  we  curse  all  pirates  and  corsairs, 
especially  such  as  infest  our  seas.' " 

The  cardinal  knew  that  his  master's  spirit  was  such 
as  appears  in  these  words.  He  pressed  the  Emperor 
and  the  council  of  princes  to  act  in  obedience  to  it, 
without  waiting  for  Luther.  But  they  all  decided 
against  him.  And  the  Emperor  Charles  the  Fifth,  the 
grandson  of  the  great  Maximilian,  and  of  Ferdinand 
and  Isabella,  so  distinguished  in  our  history,  the  greatest 
sovereign  of  his  time  and  the  greatest  Emperor  of 
Germany,  had  written  to  Luther  to  direct  him  to  attend, 
in  terms  as  respectful  as  are  these  :  — 

"  Charles,  by  the  grace  of  God,  Emperor  elect  of  the 
Romans,  always  August,  &c.,  &lc. 

"  Worshipful,  well  beloved,  and  godly !  Whereas 
we,  and  the  states  of  the  holy  Empire  here  assembled, 
have  resolved  to  institute  an  inquiry  touching  the  doc- 
trine and  writings  which  thou  hast  lately  put  forth,  we 
have  on  our  own  behalf  of  the  Empire  issued  our  safe- 
conduct,  hereunto  annexed,  for  thy  journey  hither  and 
return  to  a  place  of  security.  Our  hearty  desire  is  that 
thou  shouldst  prepare  thyself  to  set  out  immediately,  so 


224  MARTIN    LUTHER.  [a.  D.  1521. 

that  within  the  space  of  twenty-one  days  fixed  by  our 
safe-conduct  thou  mayst  without  fail  present  thyself 
before  us.  Fear  no  injustice  or  violence.  We  will 
steadily  abide  by  our  safe-conduct  aforesaid,  and  we 
expect  that  thou  wilt  pay  obedience  to  our  summons. 
Such  is  our  earnest  injunction.  Given  in  our  imperial 
city  of  Worms,  this  6th  day  of  the  month  of  March,  in 
the  year  of  our  Lord  1521,  and  the  second  of  our  reign. 

"  Charles." 

The  safe -conduct  inclosed  in  this  writ  was  directed, 
"  To  the  worshipful  our  well -beloved  and  goodly  Doctor 
Martin  Luther,  of  the  order  of  the  Augustines." 

Charles  remembered,  as  he  wrote,  the  safe-conduct 
which  Sigismund  gave  Huss,  a  century  before,  and  what 
came  of  it.  Luther  remembered  as  he  read.  All  men 
remembered  it.  It  was  spoken  of  constantly.  For  the 
cases  were  the  same,  hut  that  a  century  had  gone  by. 

And  a  century  makes  great  changes  in  such  things. 
Even  God's  kingdom  is  not  a  stationary  kingdom.  It 
comes.  It  moves.  And  after  a  century,  one  can  al- 
ways see  the  movement.  Timid  men  had  begged 
Luther  not  to  go.  But  Luther  had  made  his  celebrated 
answer,  "Were  there  as  many  devils  at  Worms  as 
there  are  tiles  on  its  roofs,  I  would  enter  it."  His  pas- 
sage through  Germany  was  a  triumph.  It  was  one  of 
those  splendid  demonstrations,  in  which  governments  on- 
ly follow  the  people,  if  they  act  at  all,  —  when  the  people 
pour  out  to  welcome  an  exile  or  a  martyr,  fascinated 
by  the  genius  of  the  man,  and  excited  to  all  enthusiasm 
by  the  grandeur  of  his  cause.     As  he  stopped  one  day 


A.  D.  1521.]  THE    emperor's    PROMISE,  225 

by  the  way,  with  a  monk,  there  hung  on  the  wall  of  the 
cell  a  portrait  of  Savonarola.  The  fair  complexion,  the 
high,  furrowed  brow,  the  clear,  calm  blue  eye,  the  ruddy 
hair,  the  full,  firm  lips,  the  graceful,  steady  bearing,  all 
recalled  the  face  of  Jesus,  as  the  earliest  painters  de- 
picted it,  who  scorned  the  Byzantine  caricatures  of  his 
person.  Luther  gazed  long  and  earnestly  upon  this 
representation  of  one  who  had  "  endured  even  unto  the 
death."  "  Out  of  the  fire  into  glory,"  said  he  at  last, 
turning  to  his  aged  friend.  "  I  take  no  fear,  but  comfort, 
from  this  picture  thou  hast  showed  me."  So  does  one 
generation  help  the  next.     Luther  travelled  on. 

And  when  his  wagon  came  to  the  city  of  Worms,  a 
hundred  cavaliers  rode  out  to  meet  the  monk,  and  became 
his  escort.  The  Emperor's  herald  rode  before  him. 
A  friend  on  horseback  followed  close,  and  the  escort 
closed  up  around  him.  An  immense  crowd  awaited 
him  at  the  gates.  They  followed  him  through  the 
streets.  Doors  and  windows  filled  with  gazers  as  he 
passed.  He  was  taken  to  the  quarters  of  the  Knights  of 
Rhodes,  near  his  patron,  the  Elector  of  Saxony.  He 
stepped  from  his  carriage  into  the  midst  of  the  throng, 
and  in  reply  to  their  salutation  said,  "  God  will  de- 
fend me." 

The  Pope's  party  was  dismayed  by  the  enthusiasm. 
They  surrounded  the  Emperor,  and  begged  him  to  rid 
himself  of  Luther  at  once.  But  Charles  remembered 
Sigismundand  Huss,  and  answered  like  a  man,  "  What 
we  promise,  we  maintain." 

The  next  day  Luther  appeared  before  the  Diet.  The 
excitement  was  intense.     His  books  were  named  in  or- 


226  MARTIN    LUTHER.  [a.  D.  1521. 

der,  a.id  his  heresies  repeated  to  him.  He  was  asked 
to  retract.  He  acknowledged  that  he  was  the  author. 
And  then  the  assembly  was  roused  to  the  utmost,  when 
he  asked  for  time  for  his  answer  to  the  demand  made 
on  him.  The  young  Emperor  looked  at  the  sick  monk, 
and  whispered,  "  That  man  will  never  make  me  a  her- 
etic." And  so,  in  great  excitement,  the  assembly  was 
adjourned. 

Such  a  day  was  that  !  Luther  was  perhaps  the  only 
person  at  Worms  perfectly  undisturbed.  A  few  minutes 
after  his  return  from  the  Diet,  he  wrote  to  the  counsel- 
lor Cuspianus :  "  I  am  writing  to  you  from  the  yery 
midst  of  a  tempest  [perhaps  he  alluded  to  the  noise  of 
the  crowd  outside  his  hotel].     An  hour  ago  I  appeared 

before   the   Emperor  and  his  brother I  avowed 

myself  the  author  of  my  books,  and  I  have  promised  to 
give  my  answer  to-morrow  as  to  recantation.  By  the 
help  of  Jesus  Christ,  I  will  not  retract  a  single  letter  of 
my  writings." 

And,  accordingly,  the  next  day  any  hopes  or  any 
fears,  which  his  respectful  request  for  delay  may  have 
_  jused,  vanished.  He  was  summoned  ;  was  asked  if  he 
wished  to  retract  any  thing  in  his  writings.  The  ques- 
tion was  put  in  Latin  and  in  German.  "  Hereupon," 
say  the  Acts  of  Worms,  "  Doctor  Martin  Luther  made 
answer  in  a  low  and  humble  tone,  without  any  vehe- 
mence or  violence,  but  with  gentleness  and  mildness, 
and  in  a  manner  full  of  respect  and  diffidence,  yet  with 
much  joy  and  Christian  firmness."  He  said,  that  if  in 
any  thing  he  had  used  severe  and  bitter  language  to 
men,  he  was  wrong  ;  but  for  his   doctrine,   "  if  they 


A.  D.  1521.]  "l    RETRACT    NOTHING."  227 

could  convince  him  from  the  Holy  Scriptures  that  he 
was  in  error,  he  would  forthwith  throw  the  whole  into 
the  flames."  The  Chancellor  said  they  were  not  there 
to  argue,  but  to  hear  if  he  would  retract.  Then  said 
Luther :  — "I  cannot  submit  my  faith  either  to  Pope  or 
to  the  Councils,  because  it  is  clear  as  noonday  that  they 
have  often  fallen  into  error.  If,  then,  I  am  not  con- 
vinced by  Holy  Scripture,  and  if  my  judgment  is  not 
thus  brought  into  subjection  to  God's  word,  I  neither 
will  nor  can  retract  any  thing,  for  it  cannot  be  right  for 
a  Christian  to  speak  against  his  conscience. 

"  I  stand  here  and  can  say  no  more.  God  help  me. 
Amen." 

The  assembly  was  motionless.  The  Emperor  ex- 
claimed, "  The  monk  speaks  boldly,  with  firm  courage." 
"  If  you  do  not  retract,"  said  the  Chancellor,  as  soon 
as  the  assembly  had  recovered  from  the  impression  pro- 
duced by  Luther's  speech,  "  the  Emperor  and  the 
states  of  the  Empire  will  proceed  to  consider  how  to 
deal  with  an  obstinate  heretic."  At  these  words  Lu- 
ther's friends  trembled  ;  but  the  monk  repeated,  "  May 
God  be  my  helper !  for  I  can  retract  nothing." 

In  that  word  the  spell  of  Rome  was  broken  for  ever. 

Luther's  stay  afterwards  at  Worms  was  crowded 
with  conferences,  efforts  to  bring  about  compromise, 
and  discussions  from  which  nothing  came.  Such  inci- 
dents as  this  are  recorded  of  that  time :  — "  Luther 
had  returned  to  his  hotel,  and  w^as  seeking  in  repose  to 
recruit  his  strength,  exhausted  in  the  stern  and  trying 
events  of  the  day,  Spalatin  and  others  of  his  friends 
surrounded  him,  giving  thanks  to  God.     As  they  were 


228  BIARTIN    LUTHER.  [a.  D.  1521  , 

discoursing,  a  servant  entered,  bearing  a  silver  vase 
filled  with  Eimbeck  beer.  '  My  master,'  said  he,  as 
he  offered  it  to  Luther,  '  desires  you  to  refresh  your- 
self with  this  beverage.'  '  What  prince  is  it,'  said 
the  Wittemberg  doctor,  '  who  has  me  in  such  gra- 
cious remembrance  ?  '  It  was  the  aged  Duke  Eric  of 
Brunswick.  The  Reformer  was  moved  by  this  offer- 
ing from  a  powerful  lord  belonging  to  the  Pope's  party. 
'  His  Highness  himself,'  continued  the  messenger, 
'  drank  of  the  cup  before  sending  it  to  you.'  Hereup- 
on Luther,  being  thirsty,  poured  out  some  of  the  Duke's 
beer,  and  after  having  drunk  he  said,  '  As  on  this  day 
Duke  Eric  has  remembered  me,  may  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  remeiTiber  him  in  the  last  hour  of  his  struggle.' 
The  gift  was  a  trifling  one  ;  but  Luther,  desiring  to 
show  his  gratitude  to  a  prince  who  thought  of  him  at 
such  a  moment,  gave  him  of  such  as  he  had,  —  a  prayer ! 
The  servant  bore  his  message  to  his  master.  The  aged 
Duke  called  to  mind  these  words  at  the  moment  of  his 
death,  and  addressing  a  young  page,  Francis  Kram, 
who  was  standing  at  his  bedside,  '  Take  the  Bible,'  said 
he,  '  and  read  to  me.'  The  youth  read  the  words  of 
Christ,  and  the  soul  of  the  dying  man  took  comfort. 
'  Whosoever  shall  give  you  a  cup  of  water  to  drink  in 
my  name,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ,'  said  the  Sav- 
iour, '  verily  I  say  unto  you  he  shall  not  lose  his  reward.'  " 

Others,  instead  of  thus  encouraging  Luther,  begged 
him  to  give  way.  The  young  and  gallant  Emperor 
caused  this  message  to  be  read  in  the  Diet,  the  day  af- 
ter Luther's  refusal :  — 

"Descended  from  the  Christian  Emperors  of  Germa- 


A.  D.  1521.]  THE    GREAT    DIVISION.  229 

ny,  from  the  Catholic  Kings  of  Spain,  from  the  Arch- 
dukes of  Austria  and  Dukes  of  Burgundy,  who  have 
all  distinguished  themselves  as  defenders  of  the  faith 
of  Rome,  I  am  firmly  resolved  to  tread  in  the  footsteps 
of  my  ancestors.  A  single  monk,  led  astray  by  his 
own  madness,  erects  himself  against  the  faith  of  Chris- 
tendom. I  will  sacrifice  my  kingdoms,  my  power,  my 
friends,  my  treasure,  my  body  and  blood,  my  thoughts 
and  my  life,  to  stay  the  further  progress  of  this  im- 
piety. I  am  about  to  dismiss  the  Augustine  Luther, 
forbidding  him  to  cause  the  least  disturbance  among  the 
people.  I  will  then  take  measures  against  him  and  his 
adherents,  as  open  heretics,  by  excommunication,  inter- 
dict, and  every  means  necessary  to  their  destruction. 
I  call  on  the  members  of  the  states  to  comport  them- 
selves like  faithful  Christians." 

But  when  Charles  was  surrounded  by  those  who 
would  persuade  him  to  violate  his  safe-conduct  of  Lu- 
ther, he  again  refused.  He  extended  it  for  twenty-one 
days.  Luther  returned  in  triumph  from  Worms.  His 
friend,  the  Elector,  secreted  him  for  a  time  in  his  fa- 
mous retirement  at  Wartburg. 

From  this  moment,  however,  the  division  between  the 
Protestant  and  the  Catholic  provinces  of  Germany,  and, 
finally,  the  Protestant  and  Catholic  countries  of  the 
world,  began. 

NOTE   TO   CHAPTER  XXII. 

D'Aubigne's  History,  too  highly  colored   sometimes,  has   the 
two  overruling  merits,  that  it  is  intensely  interesting,  and  that  it 
quotes  the  originals  where  it  is  possible,  instead  of  hashing  them. 
NO.   VIII.  20 


230  LOYOLA.  [a.d.  1521. 

up,  and  warming  them  over.  Use  Carter's  edition,  with  notes,  if 
possible.     Oar  quotations  are  almost  all  from  these  volumes. 

Mrs.  Lee's  Luther  and  his  Times  is  very  ingenious  and  entertain- 
ing.    Boston:  Hilliard,  Gray,  &  Co.     1839. 

Carlyle's  Hero  as  Priest,  in  Heroes  in  History. 

Michelet's  Life  of  Martin  Luther.  Gathered  from  his  own 
writings.  Translated  by  G.  H.  Smith.  New  York:  Appleton 
&  Co.     1846.    pp.  314. 


CHAPTER    XXIII. 

THE    JESUITS. LOYOLA. XAVIER. 

A  Spanish  gentleman,  a  daring  soldier,  who  had  been 
terribly  wounded  in  leading  some  frightened  troops  at 
the  siege  of  Pampeluna,  lay  in  the  hospital,  waiting  a 
half  recovery,  while  Luther  and  the  Diet  at  Worms 
were  in  discussion  on  the  Reform  of  the  Church.  He 
was  Ignatius  Loyola,  now  thirty  years  old.  He  had 
been  a  reckless,  dissipated  man.  He  lay  repining  in 
his  forced  captivity.  He  asked  for  books,  and  they  had 
no  books  of  chivalry  for  him,  but  gave  to  him  "  The 
Lives  of  the  Saints  "  to  read.  As  he  read,  dreams  of 
new  forms  of  adventure  came  over  him.  As  he  recov- 
ered, he  had,  or  thought  he  had,  a  vision  from  the  Vir- 
gin Mary.  He  devoted  himself  to  her  in  a  vow, —  as 
knights  did  to  the  ladies  of  their  love.  In  his  devotion 
to  her,  he  lived  as  a  beggar  caring  for  the  sick  in  hos- 
pitals. In  his  extravagances  of  poverty  and  religious 
exultation  he  excited  the  suspicion  of  the  Inquisition. 
He  applied  to  be  made  a  priest,  but  was  told  he  had  not 
yet  studied  enough  of  theology. 


A.  D.  1540.]     THE  SOCIETY  OF  JESUS.  231 

So  little  did  the  Catholics  of  the  time  foresee  the  en- 
ergy of  the  man  who  was  to  give  to  the  Catholic  Church 
the  enginery  by  which  it  withstood  the  rapid  advance  of 
the  Reformation. 

Loyola  went  to  Paris  to  study  at  the  University. 
There  he  inspired  several  young  men  with  an  eager 
devotion,  such  as  is  always  called  fanaticism,  like  his 
own.  They  bound  themselves  by  a  vow  to  devote 
themselves  in  poverty,  and  without  ambition,  to  conver' 
infidels.  And  first  they  agreed,  if  possible,  to  go  to 
Jerusalem.  But  this  proving  impossible,  they  stopped  at 
Rome,  and  obtained  from  the  Pope,  Paul  the  Second,  a 
charter,  by  which  the  "  Society  of  Jesus  "  was  formed, 
for  the  conversion  of  infidels  to  the  Faith. 

It  was  almost  military  in  its  organization.  Its  mem- 
bers were  not  necessarily  priests.  It  was  provided 
that  they  should  be  as  far  as  possible  skilled  in  the 
learning,  graces,  and  accomplishments  of  the  world. 
They  vowed  poverty,  obedience,  and  chastity,  and  sub- 
mission to  the  Pope.  They  were  to  obey  absolutely  the 
command  of  their  General.  A  well-organized  system  of 
government  extended  from  him  down  to  the  humblest 
novice.  So  that  at  any  time  the  General  of  the  Jesuits 
could  read  in  the  reports  made  to  him  the  character  and 
fitness  for  especial  duties  of  every  member  of  the  body. 
"  We  have,"  cried  one  of  them,  "  men  fitted  for  every 
thing,  —  teachers  for  teaching,  governors  for  governing, 
and,  if  they  are  needed,  martyrs  for  martyrdom." 

From  that  day  to  this,  with  the  energy  of  an  obedient 
army,  the  Jesuit  body  has  worked  as  one  man,  almost. 
It  has  met  countless  obstacles.    It  has  been  all  but  over- 


232  XAviER.  [a.  d.  1549. 

whelmed.  Compared  with  its  greatness  in  its  first  and 
second  centuries,  it  is  now  ahiiost  nothing.  But  it  has 
held  to  its  rules,  and  its  members  have  held  with  signal 
gallantry  to  their  oars.  They  are  working  on  a  sys-' 
tem  which  we  have  tried  to  describe,*  where  one  head 
cares  for  many  hands,  —  a  system  which  seems  to  have 
an  incurable  weakness  in  its  foundation.  So  thej  al- 
most achieved  empire  in  Paraguay,  and  at  the  very 
moment  of  success  lost  all.  So  in  China  they  were 
prime  ministers  of  the  Emperor,  and  just  as  they 
grasped  every  thing  lost  all.  So  in  Japan,  they  opened 
its  secrets  to  the  European  world,  passed  from  step«to 
step  triumphantly,  till,  just  as  they  were  stepping  up 
the  footsteps  of  the  throne,  they  lost  all. 

But  they  never  own  they  are  discouraged. 

They  teach,  thus,  a  great  lesson  to  the  rest  of  the 
Christian  world. 

"  The  spirit  which  appeared  in  them,"  says  Macau- 
lay,  "  animated  the  whole  Catholic  woi'ld.  The  court 
of  Rome  itself  was  purified."  And  the  issue  of  this 
change  of  spirit  was,  that,  while  "  fifty  years  after  the 
Lutheran  separation  Catholicism  could  hardly  main- 
tain itself  on  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean,  a  hun- 
dred years  after  Protestantism  could  scarcely  main- 
tain itself  on  the  shores  of  the  Baltic. 

An  illustration,  especially  interesting  at  the  present 
moment,  of  their  dashing  rapidity  of  advance,  may  be 
drawn  from  Xavier's  beginning  in  Japan.  Francis 
Xavier  was  the  friend  of  Loyola,  and,  after  him,  the 

*  Chap.  XY.  p.  171. 


A.  D.  1549.]     PREACHES  IN  JAPANESE.  233 

most  prominent  of  the  founders  of  the  Order.  As  the 
closest  abridgment  would  not  follow  his  labors  in  the 
space  we  have  here,  we  copy  in  its  quaint  detail  the 
description  of  his  first  landing  in  Japan. 

He  landed  in  1549  from  a  pirate  junk  which  he  had 
chartered,  with  a  few  companions,  one  of  whom  was  a 
native  Japanese,  named  Paul,  already  converted  at  Goa. 
The  king  of  the  country,  anxious  to  secure  the  Portu- 
guese trade,  received  him  kindly.  "  Having  therefore 
brought  into  the  city  the  consecrated  vessels,  he  bap- 
tized first  the  wife  and  daughter  of  Paul,  and  many  of 
his  kinsmen  and  friends.  Others  followed  in  the  faith, 
and  Xavier  devoted  himself  to  them  with  eagerness. 
He  resolved,  as  soon  as  he  had  gained  any  use  of  the 
language,  to  go  to  Meacum,  the  capital,  to  carry  th& 
Gospel  to  the  king  or  emperor.  Meanwhile  opportunity 
served  to  preach  at  other  cities.  At  Amangutium  Xaviei 
addressed  the  king  for  an  hour,  explaining  the  Christian 
mysteries  in  a  way  which  gained  attentive  hearing.  He 
was  dismissed  without  honor,  but  without  injury  ;  —  and 
he  and  his  friend  all  that  day  harangued  immense  multi- 
tudes in  the  city.  Their  garments  were  old,  and  of  out- 
landish fashion,  and  they  themselves,  of  course,  without 
any  skill  in  rhetoric.  At  first,  nothing  could  have  seemed 
more  absurd  to  the  people.  The  gentry  and  the  common 
people  united  in  ridicule,  and  surrounded  them  with  ev- 
ery sort  of  insult.  Thence  they  started  for  the  capital. 
Their  journey  took  them  two  months  of  travel  by  land 
and  water,  through  waters  infested  by  pirates,  and  over 
land  swarming  with  robbers.  Snow  and  frost,  forests 
and  defiles,  hindered  them.  But  they  made  their  jour- 
20* 


234  XAViER.  [a.  d.  1549. 

ney,  notwithstanding,  with  no  human  aid.  For  their 
food  they  had  parched  corn,*  which,  with  running  wa- 
ter, made  their  meals.  Ignorant  of  the  road,  not  know- 
ing where  they  might  meet  robbers,  they  followed  as 
fast  as  they  could  on  foot  the  natives  who  travelled 
mounted,  never  laying  off  their  long  robes,  always 
barefooted,  and  often  wading  the  swollen  torrents  on 
their  way.  Their  feet  swelled  with  the  cold  of  snow  and 
ice.  At  night,  drenched  with  rain,  and  worn  out  with 
cold  and  hunger,  they  slept  under  any  roof  that  offered, 
or,  if  there  were  no  hospitality,  under  the  open  sky. 
For  often  in  the  villages  and  towns  they  were  greeted, 
not  only  by  the  scoffs  of  the  people,  but  by  showers  of 
stones.  And  when  there  was  a  boat  voyage  in  the  jour- 
ney, they  were  made  to  go  in  the  very  hold  of  the 
boats,  as  if  they  were  cattle.  It  was  miraculous  that 
they  came  safe  to  Meacum,  through  such  sufferings. 

"  And  it  proved  that  it  was  no  time  for  planting  the 
Gospel.  Wars  were  breaking  out,  and  all  ears  were 
deaf  to  the  tidings  of  salvation.  It  was  impossible  to 
address  the  Emperor,  although  they  exerted  themselves 
to  do  so.  And  the  end  of  the  whole  was,  that,  after 
they  had  learned  all  they  could  of  the  land  and  its  peo- 
ple, they  returned  with  like  adventures  to  Amangutium, 
whence  they  had  started." 

A  single  instance  this  of  Xavier's  perseverance. 
Not  in  the  least  discouraged,  he  now  adopts  a  new  plan 
of  addressing  the  king  of  Amangutium.  A  Portuguese 
ship  having  arrived,  he   provides   himself  with  costly 

*  The  Latin  of  Maffei  is  "  bolos  oryz^e  seraitortse." 


A.  D.  1549.]  PRESENTS    TO    THE    KING.  235 

raiment  and   letters  of  testimony  from  the  Governor 
of  India  and  Bishop  of  Goa,  and  seeks  audience. 

"  The  Governor  of  Malacca  had  sent  presents  to  the 
Japanese.  Among  them  vv^as  a  sumptuous  Portuguese 
dress,  and  some  wine  of  Portugal,  a  harp,  and  one  of 
those  clocks  which,  by  the  movement  of  weights  and 
the  mutual  action  of  many-toothed  wheels,  indicate  the 
passage  of  time  by  a  regular  and  slow  motion.  For  this 
invention  of  European  ingenuity  greatly  amazes  all 
those  nations." 

With  the  presents  thus  quaintly  described,  Xavier 
went  to  court.  The  king  offered  presents  in  return, 
which  he  refused.  The  king  saw  that  he  had  a  great 
man  to  deal  with,  and  offered  him  quarters  in  an  empty 
convent  of  the  Bonzes,  a  religious  sect  of  the  country, 
and  proclaimed  entire  freedom  for  his  preaching.  The 
attention  of  the  people  was  gained,  in  a  measure,  and 
the  first  converts  to  the  faith  were  made. 

Xavier,  meanwhile,  with  a  zeal  and  skill  which  we 
now  call  Jesuitical,  devoted  himself  eagerly  to  learn- 
ing the  manners  and  customs  of  the  Japanese  ;  although 
so  strange  to  foreigners.  As  far  as  was  in  his  power, 
he  assumed  their  customs,  as  if  he  were  a  native  born. 
The  conversions,  however,  were  not  very  rapid.  "  He 
did  not  fish  with  the  net,"  says  Bartoli,  "  bringing  in 
whole  tribes  to  be  baptized,  but  only  with  the  hook, 
calling  them  one  by  one." 

To  gain  new  resources  for  the  mission  thus  estab- 
lished, the  indefatigable  Xavier  returned  to  Goa.  After 
a  hard-working  and  laborious  journey,  he  prepared,  at 
Canton,  for  a  secret  voyage  to  Japan.     He  sent  home 


236        THE  POLISH  UNITARIANS.   [a.  D.  1587- 1657. 

his  sick  companion,  Ferreria.  For  one  and  another 
purpose  he  was  left  by  the  Portuguese.  He  waited  for 
certain  Chinese  seamen.  And  there,  where  is  now 
Macao,  in  one  of  the  huts  such  as  the  Portuguese  buih 
on  the  beach,  open  to  the  cold  and  the  weather,  a  fever 
seized  upon  him.  No  help  came.  And,  "  destitute  of 
every  thing  needful,  the  brother  and  disciple  of  Christ 
in  death,  as  he  had  been  in  life,  gathering  from  the 
Psalter  little  arrows,  all  burning  with  love  divine,  and 
darting  them  to  heaven,  calling  gently  on  Jesus  and 
Mary,  he  left  the  body  which  he  had  long  before  sub- 
dued." 

Such  was  the  death  of  the  most  adventurous  of  mis- 
sionaries. 

But  the  foothold  he  had  gained  in  Japan  was  retained 
by  the  Jesuit  brethren.  Their  influence  increased,  till 
it  became  the  controlling  influence  with  the  ruling 
party.  But  a  counter-revolution  threw  them  out  of 
power.  In  1622  Christianity  was  suppressed  with  great 
cruelty  ;  —  thousands  of  Christians  were  killed,  and 
Europeans  driven  by  law  from  the  kingdom. 


CHAPTER    XXIV. 

THE    POLISH   unitarians. MARTIN    RUARUS. 

Poland  was  still  a  nation.  It  was  a  nation  which 
gave  toleration  to  all  religions. 

In  Poland,  therefore,  till  the  year  1658,  were  the 
strongest  bodies  of  Unitarian  Christians  who  had  gath- 


A.  LI.  1587-1657.]      PERSECUTED  REFORMERS.  237 

ered  anywhere  in  Europe.  Among  those  who  protested 
against  the  doctrine  of  Rome  were  in  all  times  em- 
braced many  who  did  not  regard  Jesus  as  God.  The 
Roman  Church  branded  them  as  heretics  under  differ- 
ent names,  most  often  using  that  of  Arians.  Of  course 
they  showed  themselves  in  as  large  a  proportion  in  all 
parts  of  Protestant  Europe,  as  soon  as  the  Reformation 
was  proclaimed. 

Martin  Ruarus,  of  whom  this  chapter  is  to  speak, 
says,  in  a  letter  to  one  of  his  brothers,  in  speaking  of 
Luther,  "  I  was  not  disposed  to  follow  the  lictor  when 
I  could  follow  his  sovereign."  For  though  he  had  high 
regard  for  Luther,  he  still  held  Luther's  opinion,  that 
every  man  must  take  his  religion  from  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures alone. 

All  around  Luther  were  such  men.  He  could  not 
hold  them  to  his  faith.  They  studied  the  Bible  as  he 
did,  and  made  their  own  faith  as  he  did.  But  in  almost 
all  countries,  the  Reformers,  eager  to  show  that  their 
footsteps  were  sure,  and  that  they  would  not  abuse  their 
new-gained  freedom,  chose  to  do  this  by  punishing 
those,  even  the  purest  of  Reformers,  who  preached  or 
believed  that  Jesus  was  not  God.  In  Italy,  the  Inquisi- 
tion persecuted  such  men.  In  Geneva,  the  Calvinists 
burnt  one  of  them.  In  England,  one  or  more  met  the 
same  fate  ;  and  in  Northern  Germany  and  Holland,^ 
they  were  exiled.  In  Poland,  for  a  while,  they  were  at 
home. 

Martin  Ruarus  was  driven  thither  in  1622.  He 
was  earnestly  invited  to  go  to  England  to  take  charge 
of  some  school  or  chapel  there.     But  it  was  just  when 


238  THE  POLISH  UNITARIANS.      [a.  D.  1587- 1657. 

King  James  was  "  harrying  out  of  England  "  the  best 
blood  of  England,  and  he  did  not  go.  England  was 
not  then  the  safe  home  of  bold  thinkers.  He  took 
charge  of  a  college  at  Rakow,  which  became  a  distin- 
guished institution.  And  so  it  happened  that  he  was  in 
correspondence  with  learned  men  all  over  Europe,  who 
had  any  interest  in  freedom  of  thought.  His  letters 
show  something  of  what  Europe  was  beginning  to  be, 
— 'Very  different  from  the  Europe  of  Luther,  more 
so  from  that  of  Huss  or  of  King  Richard,  yet  by  no 
means  the  Europe  of  our  time.  Thus  he  answers  let- 
ters which  had  been  a  year  on  their  way  to  him  by 
some  circuitous  channel,  where  now  he  would  receive 
them  in  a  day.  Books  were  still  dear  ;  and  if  he  bought 
a  precious  volume,  it  was  with  the  savings  of  an  econo- 
my which  long  tortured  him.  His  father  and  mother 
and  brothers  lived  in  Alsace.  Their  letters  were  four 
months,  by  the  routes  of  trade,  coming  to  him.  Ru- 
mors came  to  them,  much  more  quickly,  perhaps,  that 
he  was  a  heretic.  Of  such  rumors  he  speaks,  showing 
that  their  anxiety  for  him  costs  him  dear  :  — 

"  In  each  of  your  letters,  my  dear  brother,  you  speak 
to  me  of  the  rumor  of  my  heresy,  which  men  whom 
I  have  never  injured  have  scattered  among  my  parents 
and  kinsfolk.  If  it  is  heresy  to  believe  whatever  is 
written  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  or  can  be  fairly  drawn 
from  them,  I  own  that  I  do  not  shrink  from  the  charge, 
which,  indeed,  I  share  with  the  Apostle  Paul.  But  if 
there  are  those  who  are  offended  with  me,  because  I 
have  searched  very  freely  into  the  doctrines  of  various 
sects,  and  do  not  adore  certain  theologians  as  if  they 


A.  D.  1587-  1657.]       RUARTJS  AND  HIS  MOTHER.  239 

were  magic  shields  fallen  from  heaven,  or  as  if  their 
words  were  oracles,  I  am  willing  to  own  that  so  far  I 
offend.  —  taking  this  very  Paul  as  my  authority,  who 
bids  us  quench  not  the  spirit,  despise  not  prophesyings, 
but  prove  all  things  ;  and  his  disciples,  the  Bereans, 
also,  who  did  not  hesitate  to  compare  the  preaching 
even  of  so  great  an  Apostle  with  their  Scripture  before 
they  trusted  it." 

Similar  words  might  be  quoted  from  Luther.  Be- 
tween him  and  the  Unitarians  of  Poland  was  the  differ- 
ence, however,  that  he  lost  his  toleration  for  those  who, 
following  his  injunction,  and  for  themselves  searching 
the  Scriptures,  came  to  different  conclusions  from  him. 
The  Unitarians  of  his  time  never  so  far  forgot  his  great 
principle.  Indeed,  as  they  were  never  in  power  in 
Europe,  they  had  not  the  temptation  to  do  so. 

Besides  the  sufferings  which  they  endured  at  the 
hands  of  those  who  drove  them  from  land  to  land,  these 
boldest  speculators  of  those  times  went  through  the 
harder  sufferings  which  every  one  knows  who  has  felt 
the  force  of  Christ's  words,  "  Whoso  loveth  father  and 
mother  more  than  me,  is  not  worthy  of  me."  In  writ- 
ing to  these  brothers,  Martin  Ruarus  uses  words  which 
might  almost  be  supposed  to  come  from  some  convert 
of  to-day,  so  universal  is  the  language  of  affection. 
"  You  repeat  the  old  story  of  my  heresy,  which  is  in 
every  mouth  ;  you  tell  me  of  sharp  words,  of  the  com- 
miseration of  friends,  and,  worst  of  all,  of  the  grief 
of  my  most  beloved  mother,  who  can  hardly  be  per- 
suaded to  live  in  such  suffering.  Do  you  think,  my 
brothers,  that  this  is  not  bitterness  to  me  .?    I  am  no  such 


240  THE  POLISH  UNITARIANS.       [a.  D.  1587-1657. 

Stoic.     I  have  no  such  iron  heart  that  I  am  not  moved 

by  these  words  of  yours I  am   most  distressed 

about  her,  —  how  I  may  lighten  her  anguish.  Perhaps 
she  wishes  that  I  would  return  into  our  country.  But 
this,  if  possible,  I  must  defer  ;  not  only  because  my  du- 
ties here  detain  me,  but  because  I  am  immersed  here  in 
a  sea  of  controversy  and  discussion,  which  my  whole 
nature  abhors,  —  the  more  so,  that  it  has  just  begun  its 
surges.  I  have  tried  two  or  three  times  to  console  her 
wiih  letters,  but  I  do  not  know  how  these  have  succeed- 
ed ;  for  since  your  visit,  I  have  not  received  a  line  from 
my  parents.  She  is,  as  you  know,  too  much  given  to 
grief.  She  is  the  enemy  of  her  own  happiness.  How 
she  wept  when  those  verses  of  mine,  which  some  one 
had  cried  up  to  heaven,  were  pulled  down,  like  Vulcan, 
by  some  one  else,  and  came  limping  to  the  earth.  Will 
she  always  grieve  so,  when  unkind  men  proclaim  me  a 
poor  poet,  or  a  boaster,  or  a  perverse  heretic,  falsely  ? 
Tell  her,  my  brothers,  boldly,  that  there  is  no  damnable 
heresy  in  my  mind  ;  that,  though  I  may  err,  I  can  never 
be  a  heretic  as  long  as  God  preserves  to  me  my  days." 

The  passage  is  a  simple  one,  from  a  private  letter. 
We  quote  it  only  to  contrast  it  with  the  sufferings  of 
Xavier.  To  a  true  heart,  the  suffering  of  the  Polish 
minister  is  as  hard  to  bear  as  the  labors  of  the  mission- 
ary in  Japan.  It  is  by  such  different  trials  that  God 
calls  his  children  to  lead  the  world  along. 

The  Polish  Unitarians  were  not  left  to  such  sufferings 
only.  In  1658,  the  year  after  Ruarus  died,  they  were 
banished  from  Poland  by  the- Catholic  influence,  —  the 
other  Reformed  Christians  not  interfering  in  their  behalf. 


A.  D.  1587- 1657.]       PLEA    BY    RUARUS.  241 

They  took  refuge  with  their  brethren  in  Transylvania. 
And  there,  behind  the  mountains,  in  the  only  possession 
of  unhappy  Hungary  which  Austrian  or  Russian  armies 
did  not  reach  in  the  late  struggle,  their  descendants, 
their  schools,  and  their  churches  remain  to  this  day. 

There  is  a  curious  plea  by  Ruarus,  showing  the 
grounds  on  which  the  Roman  Church  should  extend 
sympathy  to  them.  The  name  Socinians,  which  is  used 
in  it,  is  derived  from  Faustus  Socinus,  their  distin- 
guished leader  in  the  sixteenth  century.  Ruarus  says 
in  it, — 

1st.  That  they  sincerely  make  the  Scriptures  their 
rule  of  faith. 

2d.  That  they  are  willing  to  accept  "  the  Apostles' 
Creed." 

3d.  That  all  their  own  doctrines  may  be  expressed 
in  the  words  of  Scripture,  and  are  not  denied  by  any 
Christians.  Although  the  Roman  Church  adds  some 
which  they  cannot  accept,  their  faith  ought  not,  there- 
fore, to  be  called  false,  because  it  rests  in  the  things 
which  they  believe,  not  in  those  which  they  do  not  be- 
lieve. 

4th.  That  the  Roman  Church  sustains  many  of  those 
opinions  which  they  reject,  on  the  authority  of  Coun- 
cils or  the  traditions  of  the  Fathers,  acknowledging 
that  they  are  not  to  be  expressly  found  in  the  Holy 
Scriptures.  In  rejecting  these,  the  Unitarians  and  So- 
cinians are  in  the  same  position  with  other  Protestants. 

5th.  Because  the  Unitarians  condemn  no  one  for 
error  only,  and  are  prepared  to  cultivate  brotherhood 
with  all  who  believe  Jesus  to  be  the  Christ. 

NO.  VIII.  21 


242  THE  POLISH  UNITARIANS,      [a.  d.  1587-  1657. 

6th.  That  they  are  not  difficult  about  rites  or  phrases. 

7th.  That,  in  the  chief  doctrines  of  Christian  faith, 
they  agree  with  the  Roman  Church  more  than  any 
other  does  ;  for  instance,  in  the  doctrine  of  predestina- 
tion ;  in  that  of  conditional  election  and  reprobation  ;  in 
the  universality  of  the  grace  of  God,  and  the  value  of 
the  death  of  Jesus ;  in  the  freedom  of  the  will,  and  its 
intervention  in  converting  men  to  the  faith  ;  in  justifi- 
cation which  works  by  love  ;  in  the  necessity  of  good 
works,  which  they  urge  as  no  other  church  does ;  in 
the  possibility  of  obeying  the  directions  of  God  ;  in  the 
difference  between  the  Old  and  New  Testament ;  in 
the  excellency  of  the  latter  above  the  former,  both  in 
its  promises  and  in  its  precepts  ;  in  the  distinction  be- 
tween venial  and  mortal  sins  ;  in  the  distinction  between 
the  baptism  of  John  and  that  of  Christ. 

We  must  leave  them  and  their  history.  Let  this 
only  be  said  of  them  in  closing,  that  because  they  were 
the  freest  inquirers  in  Christendom,  they  were  its  most 
successful  defenders.  No  one  could  charge  them  with 
shrinking  from  any  truth.  And  so  against  all  infidel 
writers  they  defended  Christianity  as  no  other  writers 
of  the  seventeenth  century  knew  how.  And  the 
churches  and  Christians  who  excommunicated  them, 
and  drove  them  from  city  to  city,  were  glad  to  use  their 
defences  against  scoffers  and  assailants. 


NOTE  TO   CHAPTER  XXIV. 

Mr.  Osgood's  paper,  Socinus  and  the  Polish  Unitarians,  in 
Studies  of  Christian  Biography. 


A.  D,  1663-1728.]       NEW  ENGLAND  LIFE.  ^  243 

CHAPTER    XXV. 

NEW   ENGLAND.  —  COTTON    MATHER. 

Clovis,  St.  Leger,  Alfred,  and  Richard  the  First 
show  different  forms  of  Christianity,  indeed,  from  these 
which  we  see  in  Luther's  time,  in  the  Socinians'  time, 
or  in  our  own  time.  Of  various  forms  of  reHgion  and 
society  which  have  appeared  in  the  change  between  the 
earlier  period  and  that  in  which  we  live,  we  can  speak 
of  but  one  more.  This  is  the  New  England  life  of  a 
century  and  a  half  ago,  in  the  days  of  Cotton  Mather. 

He  was  born  to  be  a  New  England  minister  as  cer- 
tainly as  the  eldest  son  of  an  English  duke  is  born  to 
be  a  duke.  The  Puritans  in  their  exile  had  attempted 
to  found  a  commonwealth,  which  should  be  itself  a 
religious  organization.  And  for  a  hundred  years  at 
least,  the  offices  of  the  church  were  the  highest  offices, 
and  made  the  aristocracy  of  the  state.  They  obeyed 
Jesus's  precept  literally.  And  those  who  wished  to  be 
gKeat  among  them  became  their  ministers.  Cotton 
Mather's  father  was  a  minister.  His  father  was  one. 
And  his  father  before  him  was  one,  who  had  been  driven 
to  emigrate  because  he  had  suffered  loss  for  his  con- 
stancy to  the  faith  in  England. 

So  Cotton  Mather  was  named  as  a  child  for  the  min- 
istry. He  was  named  after  the  great  John  Cotton,  who 
first  preached  the  Gospel  in  Boston.  In  Boston,  Cotton 
Mather  was  born  and  christened.  At  a  Boston  free 
school  he  learned  his  Latin  and  Greek,  with  wonderful 


244  COTTON  MATHER.   [a.  D.  1663- 1728. 

alacrity,  so  that  when  he  was  but  eleven  years  of  age 
he  entered  Harvard  College.  While  he  was  a  student 
there,  his  father  was  asked  to  become  its  president,  but 
he  declined.  The  young  student  studied  well.  He 
left  college  young,  he  began  to  preach  young,  and  was 
settled  as  the  minister  of  the  North  Church  in  Boston, 
almost  as  a  matter  of  course,  as  colleague  with  his 
father. 

Now,  this  was  in  a  colony  which  had  been  formed 
by  people  whose  first  principle  was,  that  every  congre- 
gation was  independent  of  every  other,  and  of  the 
clergy  ;  and  that  the  laymen  themselves  had  a  right  to 
ordain  a  minister  by  their  own  act  and  choice.  But 
in  fifty  or  sixty  years  this  bold  independence  had  sub- 
sided into  such  quiet  arrangements,  as  under  the  forms 
of  congregational  action  left  it  to  the  ministers  of  the 
colony  to  make  provisions  for  the  churches  very  much 
as  they  themselves  chose. 

Another  change  was  in  the  spirit  of  the  people  them- 
selves. In  affliction  they  had  cried  unto  the  Lord,  and 
he  had  heard  them.  But  the  prosperity  of  sixty  years, 
v/holly  free  from  persecution,  had  left  them,  no  doubt, 
a  moral,  and  certainly  a  very  formal  people,  but  by  no 
means  a  specially  religious  or  Christly  people,  in  the 
very  highest  sense  of  those  words. 

And  Cotton  Mather  himself  was  so  far  unlike  the 
great  John  Cotton,  whose  name  he  bore,  that,  while  that 
old  Puritan,  every  Sunday  and  lecture  day,  was  running 
over  with  topics  of  appeal  to  the  people,  who,  in  a  log- 
built  church,  listened  to  him  in  the  half-cleared  forest,  — 
topics  which  he  drew  from  their  own  lives,  their  own 


A.  D.  1663- 1728.]  THUNDER.  245 

sins,  and  their  own  eternal  necessities,  —  the  respecta- 
ble, well-trained  young  minister  who  bore  his  name  was 
studying  all  useful  and  all  useless  science,  crowding 
into  his  pulpit  all  the  ends  and  scraps  of  a  strange 
learning,  astonishing  his  people  with  his  Hebrew  and 
his  Greek,  and  wondering,  at  times,  that  they  were  not 
more  devout  and  spiritual  than  they  were. 

Not  that  Cotton  Mather  did  not  love  to  seize,  even  too 
eagerly,  on  the  incidents  around  him.  One  of  his  ser- 
mons is  called,  —  "  Brontologia  Sacra.  The  Voice  of 
the  Glorious  God  in  the  Thunder.  Explained  and  ap- 
plied in  a  Sermon  uttered  by  a  Minister  of  the  Gospel, 
in  a  Lecture  unto  an  Assembly  of  Christians  abroad,  at 
the  very  same  Time  when  the  Thunder  was,  by  the  Per- 
mission and  Providence  of  God,  falling  upon  his  own 
House.  A  Discourse  useful  for  all  Men  at  all  Times  ; 
but  especially  intended  for  an  Entertainment  in  the 
Hours  of  Thundery  This  long  title  is  followed  by  an 
advertisement  three  times  as  long,  explaining  how  lie 
extemporized  the  sermon  one  Sunday  when  a  storm 
arose  which  struck  his  house.  And  it  is  preceded  by  a 
longer  Preface,  full  of  theories  now  exploded  on  thunder 
and  lightning.  Having  introduced  the  sermon  elabo- 
rately, and  arrived  at  its  second  head,  he  was  inter- 
rupted by  the  messenger  who  told  him  that  his  own 
house  was  struck.  Of  this  he  informed  the  congrega- 
tion, adding,  "  As  I  remember  there  is  in  Aben  Ezra 
this  observable  passage  of  Rabbi  Moseh,  quoted  for  a 
gloss  upon  it,  '  The  Levites  there  praise  God  for  keep- 
ing them  from  hurt  by  the  thunder.'  What  an  occa- 
sion have  I  to  do  so  this  day  ?  Instead  of  being  hereby 
21* 


246  COTTON    MATHER.       [a.  D.  1663- 1728. 

diverted  from  the  work  which  I  have  now  undertaken, 
I  would  practically  teach  you,  that,  with  a  mind  uncon- 
cerned about  the  things  of  this  life,  we  should  never 
be  unfurnished  with  devout  and  proper  thoughts  in  the 
mind  of  God  in  all  our  trials."  He  goes  on  to  give 
what  he  calls  the  "  Cartesian  account  "  of  thunder,  and 
then  his  own  ;  which  is,  "  that  with  the  Vegetable  Matter 
protruded  by  the  Subterraneous  Fire,  and  exhaled  also 
by  the  Force  of  the  Sun  in  the  Vapor  that  makes  our 
Shower,  a  Mineral  Matter  of  Nitre  and  Sulphur  does 
also  extend  into  the  Atmosphere,  and  there  it  goes  off 
with  fierce  explosions."  (These  three  would  be  the 
proper  ingredients  for  gunpowder.)  Then,  at  last,  he 
passes  to  God,  whose  voice  the  thunder  is,  and  so  to 
the  law  of  God  ;  then  to  the  future  coming  of  God ; 
then  to  the  fear  of  God  ;  then  to  self-examination  ;  then 
to  those  sins  which  thunder  punishes ;  then  to  the  word 
of  God  ;  and,  lastly,  to  thankfulness. 

"  Such  a  serious  thankfulness  manifested  in  an  an- 
swerable fruitfulness  will  be  a  better  shelter  to  us  from 
the  mischiefs  of  the  thunder  than  the  crowns  of  laurels, 
or  the  tents  of  seal  leather,  whereby  some  old  em- 
perors counted  themselves  protected  ;  or  than  all  the 
amulets  of  superstition." 

So  the  sermon  ends.  It  is  crowded  full  with  scraps 
of  Latin,  and  occupied  perhaps  an  hour  and  a  half  in 
its  delivery.  Its  science  is  antiquated.  But  that  is  no 
fault  of  Mather's.  All  science  grows  old  in  time.  But 
it  is  remarkable  because  it  shows  the  spirit,  almost  of 
effrontery,  certainly  of  patronage  and  condescending 
authority,  with  which  Mather  and  other  preachers  of  his 
time  looked  upon  their  people. 


A.  D.  1663-1728.]      FORMAL    RELIGION.  247 

In  other  things  the  same  spirit  appeared.  Thus,  if  a 
poor  girl  were  charged  with  witchcraft,  Cotton  Mather 
led  the  hue  and  cry  against  her. 

If  a  poor  pirate  were  to  be  hanged.  Cotton  Mather,  or 
the  minister  called  upon  to  teach  him,  made  it  an  occa- 
sion to  promote  his  own  honor  before  the  people. 

In  a  matter  about  the  College,  he  tells  coolly  that  his 
father  appointed  all  the  Governor's  Council  of  the  time. 

And  so  many  misfortunes,  sicknesses,  and  sudden 
deaths  does  he  relate,  as  judgments  inflicted  by  God, 
that  he  seems  the  chronicler  of  all  evil  in  his  day. 

But  such  assumption  of  dignity  and  authority  could 
not  last,  in  a  time  when  men  could  read.  It  was  only 
possible  in  a  state  like  Massachusetts,  which  had  owed 
every  thing  to  its  religion,  and  much,  therefore,  to  its 
clergy.  It  was  a  stage  of  society  which  existed  only  to 
give  place  to  a  better.  The  pictures  of  the  time  show 
how  New  England,  between  its  eager  devotional  settle- 
ment and  our  active  days,  passed  through  a  period  of 
set,  dry,  formal,  heardess  display  of  religion.  The 
Protestant  countries  of  Europe  had  a  like  experience, 
which  they  did  not  pass  through  so  safely.  From  such 
fanaticism  there  comes  next  irreligion,  carelessness,  and 
contempt  for  sacred  things.  But  with  us,  just  as  that 
result  came  on,  the  American  Revolution  broke  out.  It 
started  thought  and  compelled  it.  It  gave  freedom 
everywhere  else,  and  it  was  impossible  it  should  not 
have  given  it  in  religion.  On  the  clear  field,  then, 
which  the  dry  formalism  of  the  first  half  of  the  century 
had  left,  —  a  field  which  the  ardent  flame  of  Whitefield 
had  once  burned  over,  —  every  man  in  New  England 


248  THE    EIGHTEENTH    CENTURY. 

was  able  to  plough,  to  plant,  and  to  reap  for  himself. 
Every  man  of  thought  and  of  faith  did  so.  And  there 
sprung  up  that  multitude  of  sects,  —  that  eagerness  of 
religious  opinion, —  that  willingness  to  inquire, —  which 
makes  the  religious  aspect  of  the  New  England  of  to- 
day. New  England  will  never  again  leave  its  religion 
or  its  thinking  to  its  clergy  only.  It  has  gone  through 
that  lesson,  and  will  not  need  to  learn  it  in  the  future. 


CHAPTER    XXVI. 

THE    EIGHTEENTH    CENTURY.  SWEDENBORG. 

The  men  of  the  nineteenth  century  have  wasted  much 
time  and  power  in  abusing  the  eighteenth. 

Yet  we  cannot  help  adding  a  word  more,  to  say,  that, 
dead  as  the  religion  of  New  England  was  through  the 
beginning  of  that  century,  that  of  Europe  was  even 
more  cold,  formal,  and  heartless. 

The  Wesleys  and  Whitefield  in  England  made  a 
gallant  effort  to  rouse  the  people  of  England  to  feel  that 
they  had  living  souls,  and  that  religion  was  not  wholly 
satisfied  with  the  paying  of  tithes,  or  receiving  them. 

Occasionally  a  philanthropic  man  started  up,  and 
showed  the  cruelties  and  inhumanities  of  jails,  of  debtor 
laws,  or  of  the  marching  Highland  villagers  into  exile. 
In  such  a  case  he  became  a  person  to  be  studied,  as  an 
interesting  specimen,  by  the  philosophers  of  the  cen- 
tury.    If  he  was  of  good  manners  and  agreeable  con- 


STUDY    OF    SCIENCE.  249 

versation,  and  could  tell  pleasant  stories,  as  Howard 
could,  about  the  Empress  of  Russia  or  the  Electors  of 
Germany,  he  would  have  a  chance  of  being  fashionable. 
The  world  was  interested  in  him,  as  in  the  last  elepliant 
exhibited.  For  it  moved  along  as  if  it  were  looking  at 
a  great  museum.  It  analyzed  every  thing.  It  asked 
very  curious  questions,  and  learned  a  great  many  facts. 
It  found  out  what  air  was  made  of,  and  how  far  the 
earth  was  from  the  sun.  And  when  it  had  found  the 
fact,  it  kept  it  as  a  child  on  the  sea-shore  keeps  a  shell. 
While  it  was  new,  it  was  precious.  But,  tired  with  tlie 
weight,  as  the  world  w^ent  on,  it  was  always  eager  for 
new  facts,  and  would  let  the  old  go  without  doing  any 
thing  with  them  ;  and  then  treat  the  new  like  the  old, 
in  their  turn, 

Emanuel  Swedenborg,  a  Swedish  philosopher,  was 
one  of  the  few  men  who  lifted  himself,  or  got  lifted, 
above  this  baby-play  of  his  time.  He  began,  as  the 
students  of  his  time  all  did,  in  pulling  things  to  pieces, 
—  in  analyzing,  as  their  phrase  is.  The  men  of  that 
day  devoted  themselves  to  analysis.  They  began  with 
pulling  to  pieces  flowers  and  crystals.  They  ended,  in 
the  French  Revolution  and  the  philosophy  which  led  to 
it,  in  pulling  to  pieces  kingdoms,  and  systems  of  thought, 
and  philosophy,  and  religions.  Swedenborg  began  by 
studying  natural  philosophy.  He  was  a  great  miner  and 
engineer.  He  helped  Charles  the  Twelfth,  a  mad  sol- 
dier of  his  time,  in  his  sieges  and  wars.  There  was  no 
research  which  he  was  afraid  of.  And  so  he  went  on,  in 
anatomical  research,  with  great  success.  He  could  tell 
of  fibres  of  muscle  which  no  one  had  dissected  out  U  - 


250  SWEDENBORG.  [a.  d.  1743. 

fore.  And  at.  last  he  aimed  at  the  most  daring  of  dis- 
coveries, the  finding  by  his  anatomy  and  observation 
what  Life  was  made  of.  He  had  "  expected,"  says  Sir 
J.  G.  Wilkinson,  "  that  the  kingdom  of  God  would 
come  upon  him  in  the  shape  of  clear  principles  deduced 
from  all  human  knowledge.  His  expectations  were  ful- 
filled, not  simply,  but  marvellously." 

It  was  in  the  course  of  this  investigation  that  the  light 
came  to  him,  that  life  is  something  above  machinery. 
This  is  a  revelation  which  most  people  can  get  from  the 
Bible,  if  they  do  not  have  it  in  their  own  hearts.  But  to 
Swedenborg  it  came  as  a  supernatural  revelation,  which 
he  supposed  came  from  God  himself 

"  I  was  in  London,"  he  says,  in  describing  its  first 
demonstration  to  him,  "  and  dined  late  at  my  usual 
quarters,  where  I  had  engaged  a  room  in  which  at 
pleasure  to  prosecute  my  studies  in  natural  philosophy. 
I  was  hungry,  and  ate  with  great  appetite.  Towards 
the  end  of  the  meal,  I  remarked  that  a  kind  of  mist 
spread  before  my  eyes,  and  I  saw  the  floor  of  my  room 
covered  with  hideous  reptiles,  such  as  serpents,  toads, 
and  the  like.  I  was  astonished,  having  all  my  wits 
about  me,  and  being  perfectly  conscious.  The  darkness 
attained  its  height,  and  then  passed  away.  I  now  saw 
a  man  sitting  in  a  corner  of  the  chamber.  As  I  had 
thought  myself  entirely  alone,  I  was  greatly  frightened 
when  he  said  to  me,  '  Eat  not  so  much ! '  My  sight 
again  became  dim,  but  when  I  recovered  it  I  found  my- 
self alone  in  my  room.  The  unexpected  alarm  hastened 
my  return  home.  I  did  not  suffer  my  landlord  to  per- 
ceive that  any  thing  had  happened  ;  but  thought  it  over 


A.  D.  1743.]  SPIRITUAL    SIGHT.  251 


attentively,  and  was  not  able  to  attribute  it  to  chance, 
or  any  physical  cause.  I  went  home,  but  the  following 
night  the  same  man  appe.-xred  to  me  again.  I  was  this 
time  not  at  all  alarmed.  The  man  said  :  '  I  am  God, 
the  Lord,  the  Creator  :uid  Redeemer  of  the  world.  I 
have  chosen  thee  to  unfold  to  men  the  spiritual  sense 
of  the  Holy  Scripture.  I  will  myself  dictate  to  thee 
what  thou  shalt  write.'  The  same  night  the  world  of 
spints,  hell  and  heaven,  were  convincingly  opened  to 
me,  where  I  found  many  persons  of  my  acquaintance, 
of  all  conditions.  From  that  day  forth,  I  gave  up  all 
worldly  learning,  and  labored  only  in  spiritual  things, 
according  to  what  the  Lord  had  commanded  me  to 
write.  Thereafter  the  Lord  daily  opened  the  eyes  of 
my  spirit,  to  see  in  perfect  wakefulness  what  was  going 
on  in  the  other  world,  and  to  converse  broad  awake 
with  angels  and  spirits." 

People  are  apt  to  ask  how  such  a  vision  came  to 
such  a  man.  The  usual  answer  is,  that  any  man  might 
have  had  the  same  vision,  —  as  truly  a  revelation 
from  God,  —  under  similar  circumstances.  Svveden- 
borg  would  have  said  so  himself.  But  he  believed  it 
—  as  few  men  would  —  to  be  a  distinct  conversation 
with  the  Almighty  in  human  form.  From  that  time 
forward,  for  nearly  thirty  years  of  his  life,  he  had  simi- 
lar conversations.  He  had,  as  he  says  above,  inter- 
views with  the  spirits  of  the  departed.  He  brought  ac- 
counts of  the  worlds  in  which  they  lived.  In  twenty- 
five  or  thirty  books  he  records  the  new  views  of  Chris- 
tianity which  thus  opened  upon  him,  calling  himself 
''  the  servant  of  Jesus  Christ  "  as  he  does  so.  His  own 
account  of  the  new  revplntinn  mndn  to  him  is  this  ;  — 


252  SWEDENBORG.       [a.  d.  1688-  1772. 

"  Instead  of  miracles,  there  has  taken  place  at  the 
present  day  an  open  manifestation  of  the  Lord  himself, 
an  intromission  into  the  spiritual  world,  and  with  it, 
illumination  by  immediate  light  from  the  Lord,  in  what- 
ever relates  to  the  interior  things  of  the  Church,  but 
principally  an  opening  of  the  spiritual  sense  of  the 
Word,  in  which  the  Lord  is  present  in  his  own  divine 
light.  These  revelations  are  not  miracles,  because 
every  man,  as  to  his  spirit,  is  in  the  spiritual  world, 
without  separation  from  his  body  in  the  natural  world. 

"  As  to  myself,  indeed,  my  presence  in  the  spiritual 
world  is  attended  with  a  certain  separation,  but  only  as 
to  the  intellectual  part  of  my  mind,  not  as  to  the  will 
part.  This  manifestation  of  the  Lord,  and  intromission 
into  the  spiritual  world,  is  more  excellent  than  all  mira- 
cles ;  but  it  has  not  been  granted  to  any  one  since  the 
creation  of  the  world  as  it  has  been  to  me.  The  men 
of  the  Golden  Age,  indeed,  conversed  with  angels ;  but 
it  was  not  granted  to  them  to  be  in  any  other  light  than 
what  is  natural.  To  me,  however,  it  has  been  granted 
to  be  in  both  spiritual  and  natural  light  at  the  same 
time  ;  and  hereby  I  have  been  privileged  to  see  the 
wonderful  things  of  heaven,  to  be  in  company  with  an- 
gels, just  as  I  am  with  men,  and  at  the  same  time  to 
pursue  truths  in  the  light  of  truth,  and  thus  to  perceive, 
and  be  gifted  with  them,  consequently  to  be  led  by  the 
Lord." 

Swedenborg's  best  biographer,  and  one  of  his  most 
learned  disciples  in  our  time,  says  that  he  considers  his 
state  partly  hereditary,  physical,  and  acquired.  His 
father  and  mother  were  as  ready  to  believe  in  the  a)i- 


A.  D.  1688  - 1772.]       HIS  SYSTEM.  253 

gc'lic  inspiration  of  his  childhood,  as  he  himself  in 
similar  intercourse  with  spirits  afterwards.  His  father 
sought  in  daily  life  for  supernatural  appearances  ;  and 
spirit-seeing  has  recently  appeared*  in  a  youthful  de- 
scendant of  the  Swedenborg  family  now  living  in 
Sweden.  These  facts,  which  to  his  followers  are  so 
many  evidences  that  he  was  of  a  prophet  race,  are 
as  strong  evidences,  to  those  who  do  not  believe  that  his 
inspiration  was  quhe  what  he  thought  it,  that  his  visions 
came  to  him  from  jjo  very  high  physical  causes. 

His  system  stated,  in  distinct  language,  the  power  of 
Life  and  Spirit,  independent  of  mere  physical  laws 
and  combinations.  To  most  thinking  men  this  lan- 
guage seemed  then,  and  seems  now,  to  be  hard  and 
mechanical.  But  because  he  did  believe  in  spiritual 
power,  he  made  a  great  step  from  the  most  famous  sci- 
entific men  of  his  century,  and  from  almost  all  its  theo- 
logians. For  they  seem  really  to  have  lived  as  if  they 
had  no  vital  belief  in  the  presence  of  such  power.  So 
he  gathered,  in  what  he  called  the  New  Church,  earnest 
Christian  believers  in  every  country.  He  galh.ers  them 
still.  To  most  Christians,  probably,  his  movement  ap- 
pears the  best  spiritual  movement  of  his  time,  seeking 
escape  from  the  wretched  materialism  which  its  philos- 
ophy forced  upon  it.  But  most  Christians  feel  also, 
that  the  world  has  found  other  means  of  escape,  and 
better  than  his,  from  that  dead  pretence  of  religion  :  that 
it  has  helped  itself  by  him  in  coming  up  to  the  real 
spirit  of  the  Gospels,  and  that  it  will  still  help  itself  by 
liim^  —  without  adopting  his  forms,  which  seem  but  the 
lan^juao-e   of  his  circumstances  and   times.     His    own 

NO.  VIII.  22 


254  TAHITI.  [a.  d.  1767. 

disciples  show  the  earnestness  of  sincere  believers,  find 
more  and  more  in  his  works  of  science  and  religion, 
and  distinguish  themselves  by  their  affection  for  each 
other  and  their  philanthropy  in  the  world. 

NOTE    TO    CHAPTER   XXVL 

The  best  Life  of  Swedenborg  is  Sir  J.  G.  Wilkinson's;  reprinted 
in  Boston,  1849.     Mr.  Hobart's  is  undoubtedly  careful,  but  is  dull. 

Mr.  Emerson's  lecture  on  Swedenborg  offended  his  disciples, 
but  to  one  not  of  the  New  Church  seems  fair. 


CHAPTER    XXVII. 

PROTESTANT    MISSIONS. TAHITI. 

On  the  18th  of  June,  1767,  Captain  Wallis,  in  com- 
mand of  the  British  ship  Dolphin,  came  in  sight  of  the 
island  of  Tahiti,  till  then  unknown.  Thousands  of 
amazed  natives  thronged  to  the  shore  to  meet  him. 
They  fitted  out  their  canoes  by  hundreds,  and  came 
round  the  ship  to  examine  her.  One  of  them,  bolder 
than  the  rest,  held  up  a  branch  of  plantain  in  token  of 
peace,  and  delivered  a  speech  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour, 
which  no  man  on  board  understood.  The  English 
made  pacific  gestures,  and  invited  them  on  board.  At 
length  a  gallant  young  fellow  dared  the  hazardous 
experiment,  climbed  the  mizzen-chains  lightly,  and 
jumped  out  upon  the  top  of  an  awning  above  the  deck. 
In  this  retired  position  he  watched  the  strange  whites 
for  a  time  ;  —  his  report  was  favorable,  and  others  fol- 


A.  D.  1777.]  KING    OTOO.  255 

lowed  his  example.  They  mounted  the  ship  from 
every  direction.  The  Englishmen  gave  them  presents, 
and  all  things  passed  cordially,  till  an  unfortunate  goat 
butted  against  one  of  them,  and  mounted  to  strike  him 
again.  Instantly  the  simple  natives  all  plunged  into 
the  sea. 

This  incident  illustrates  the  complete  surprise  with 
which  the  discovery  by  the  whites  of  the  different 
paradise-like  islands  of  the  Pacific  has  been  accom- 
panied. Captain  Wallis  soon  succeeded  in  overcoming 
the  dread  of  the  natives.  He  established  a  trade  with 
them,  spent  some  pleasant  weeks  with  them,  and 
carried  tidings  of  them  to  England. 

The  island,  and  the  neighboring  islands  of  the  same 
group,  attracted  more  attention  some  years  after,  when 
the  celebrated  Captain  Cook  made  visits  there  while  he 
conducted  some  astronomical  observations.  He  be- 
came well  acquainted  with  the  people  and  their  cus- 
toms. He  even  witnessed  one  of  the  terrible  human 
sacrifices  enjoined  by  their  idolatry.  In  the  midst  of 
the  most  exquisite  productions  of  nature,  he  found  such 
evidences  of  superstitious  barbarism.  Heaps  of  skulls 
lay  in  the  courts  of  the  temples,  —  and  to  all  remon- 
strances, the  priests,  who  seemed  reckless  indeed,  an- 
swered that  their  god  delighted  in  such  sacrifice,  and 
was  fond  of  feeding  on  the  souls  of  those  who  were 
thus  devoted  to  him. 

When  Cook  left  the  island,  the  chief,  Otoo,  told  him 
that  the  fort  he  had  built  there  should  always  be  his. 
"  This  shows,"  he  says,  "  with  what  facility  a  settle- 
ment might  be  made  at  Tahiti,  which,  grateful  as  I  am 


256  TAHITI.  [a.  d.  1796- 1815. 

for  repeated  offices,  I  hope  will  never  happen.  Indeed, 
it  is  very  unlikely  that  any  measure  of  this  kind  should 
ever  be  seriously  thought  of,  as  it  can  neither  serve  the 
purposes  of  public  ambition  nor  of  private  avarice  ;  and, 
without  such  inducements,  I  may  pronounce  that  it  will 
never  be  undertaken." 

This  little  sentence  shows  how  far  the  dead  condition 
of  religion  in  England,  of  which  our  last  chapter  spoke, 
had  affected  the  brave  navigator.  He  did  not  give  a 
thought  to  that  Christian  zeal  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
discovered  America,  discovered  this  veiy  ocean  on 
which  he  sailed,*  and  opened  Japan  to  Europe,  t  But 
the  world  advanced  from  that  torpor  faster  than  he 
thought  for.  And  the  Christians  of  England,  moved  to 
a  deeper,  warmer  sense  of  the  value  of  their  faith  by 
one  and  another  influence,  such  as  we  have  tried  to  de- 
scribe, before  twenty  years  passed  made  another  effort 
to  show  that  Protestants  as  well  as  Catholics  could  con- 
quer savage  nations  for  the  cross.  In  the  Moravian 
missions,  in  our  "own  missions  among  the  Indians,  this 
had  been  shown  before.  An  English  Protestant  society 
now  sent  out,  in  the  year  1796,  a  body  of  missionaries 
to  labor  for  the  conversion  of  the  people  of  beautiful 
Tahiti. 

They  landed  in  the  spring  of  the  next  year.  The 
island  is  a  garden  paradise.  The  king,  Otoo,  and  his 
queen  met  them  on  the  beach,  welcomed  them  kindly, 
and  led  them  to  a  new  house,  where  was  to  be  their 
dwelling.     They  gave  to  them  a  tract  of  land  around  it, 

*  See  Chapter  XXI.  t  See  Chapter  XXin. 


A.  D.  1796-1815.]       DIS.COURAGEMENTS.  257 

and,  in  great  hopes  of  the  wealth  which  would  flow  in 
on  the  island  from  the  residence  of  whites,  extended  to 
them  at  first  every  hospitality.  Their  ship  sailed  away. 
And  they  were  there,  hardly  knowing  a  word  of  the  lan- 
guage, with  no  strength  but  God's  to  support  them, 
to  work  as  they  could  upon  a  barbarous  tribe.  They 
had,  from  the  little  vocabulary  made  by  early  voyagers, 
put  together  a  few  phrases  for  their  first  conversations. 
But  they  learned  afterwards  that  these  were  quite  unin- 
telligible. Where  the  Tahitians  would  have  said,  "  May 
you  have  peace  this  night,"  in  parting  for  sleep,  the 
missionaries  had  said,  "  It  is  a  mighty  night,"  —  from 
misconceptions  of  the  idiom  and  meaning  of  the  words 
they  used. 

^ut  they  labored  on  gallantly  for  years.  The  na- 
tives complained  that  they  gave  them  too  few  hatchets 
and  too  many  prayers.  They  found  that  years  passed, 
in  which  no  supplies  were  sent  to  the  mission.  Their 
selfish  motives  for  assisting  the  preachers  died  out  there- 
fore. Wars  were  constantly  raging  among  the  tribes. 
After  twelve  years  they  were  fairly  driven  from  the 
island  in  a  rebellion,  and  retired  to  Port  Jackson.  Their 
beautiful  gardens  were  destroyed,  and  their  hopes 
seemed  blighted.  But  this  was  only  that  coldest  hour 
which  always  comes  just  before  day.  In  1811,  the  ex- 
iled king,  who  had  been  driven  away  by  the  same  rebels, 
regained  his  own.  It  is  said  that  his  disappointments 
had  subdued  his  spirit  and  softened  his  heart.  When 
they  landed  again  in  the  islands,  he  received  them  with 
joy.  He  had  learned,  before,  to  read  and  write,  and 
now  spent  much  of  his  time  in  "  earnest  inquiry  about 
22* 


258  TAHITI.  [a.  d.  1796 - 1815. 

God,  and  the  way  of  acceptance  with  him,  through  Je- 
sus Christ."  They  were  encouraged  thus  to  go  on  with 
their  work  at  Eimeo,  though  they  could  not  yet  return 
to  Tahiti.  They  estabUshed  public  worship.  They 
opened  a  school  again,  and  at  last,  at  a  moment  when 
death  was  in  their  own  circle,  Pomare,  the  king  of  the 
islands  who  had  recalled  them,  came  publicly  to  profess 
his  belief  in  God,  his  contempt  for  his  idols,  and  his  de- 
sire to  be  baptized. 

This  was  the  beginning  of  after  successes.  The 
king's  party  gradually  came  to  be  known  as  the  Chris- 
tian party.  In  a  decisive  battle,  in  the  year  1815,  he 
routed  entirely  his  idolatrous  enemies.  By  the  unani- 
mous will  of  his  people,  he  was  reinstated  on  the  throne 
of  his  father.  • 

Best  of  all,  he  used  his  victory  with  a  clemency 
unknown  before  in  the  feuds  of  those  islands.  And 
thus  the  permanent  establishment  of  Christianity  there 
began. 

It  is  impossible  to  add  any  thing  here,  of  the  account 
of  after  triumphs  and  reverses.  The  success  of  the 
American  mission  in  civilizing  the  Sandwich  Islands  is 
another  chapter  in  the  Christian  successes  of  this  kind. 
Indeed,  the  institution,  thus  tested,  of  large  societies 
banded  together  by  the  tie  of  a  great  Christian  motive, 
became  common  in  Protestant  countries.  Such  socie- 
ties were  formed  on  a  scale  wholly  unknown  before. 
Bible  Societies,  Education  Societies,  Temperance  Soci- 
eties, Anti-Slavery  and  Colonization  Societies,  have  been 
formed,  and  in  their  turn  imitated,  by  those  who  sought 
any  improvement  whatever  in  morals  or  religion  in  Prot- 


CONCLUSION.  259 


estant  lands.  And  the  nineteenth  century  has  thus  begun 
to  remove  the  stigma,  which  the  formal  service  of  past 
years  had  begun  to  bring  upon  the  Gospel,  that,  in  their 
reverence  to  God,  its  votaries  forget  the  love  of  men. 

NOTE   TO  CHAPTER  XXVII. 

Ellis's  Polynesian  Researches.    The  Missionary  Herald  and 
Day- Spring. 


CHAPTER    XXVIII. 

CONCLUSION. 

If  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church  were  rightly 
taught,  Christians  might  learn  exactly  where  their  next 
step  in  the  advance  of  the  world  must  be. 

And  these  little  chapters,  if  we  could  have  told  their 
story  better,  would  have  taught  at  least  three  lessons. 

I.  Christian  history,  if  rightly  studied,  would  show 
that  we  are  not  so  far  distant  from  the  direct  influences 
of  our  Lord's  life  as  men  choose  to  think  we  are.  The 
chain  of  events  is  not  of  such  inconceivable  length  as 
it  seems  to  be  supposed. 

The  men  are  living  who  knew  the  men  who  had  seen 
our  Pilgrim  Fathers.  Of  the  Pilgrims,  some  might  have 
talked  with  companions  of  Columbus.  Columbus  was 
a  remnant  of  the  days  of  chivalry,  —  his  father  remem- 
bered those  who  served  in  the  last  Crusades.  The  Cru- 
sades cover  less  than  three  hundred  years  ;  —  but  in 
looking  at  them,  we  are  half  way  back  to  Jesus.     We 


260  CONCLUSION. 


look  at  times  when,  in  Palestine,  in  the  unchanging 
East,  there  must  have  been  authentic  and  distinct  per- 
sonal tradition  of  him  and  his.  For  instance,  Peter 
the  Hermit  talked  of  the  Saracen  conquest  there  with 
Christians  who  were  baptized  by  bishops  who  remem- 
bered the  immediate  descendants  of  the  first  Mahometan 
conquerors  ;  and  to  Mahomet  Christ's  religion  was  as 
a  thing  of  yesterday.  The  aged  hermit  who  converted 
to  it  Othman,  Mahomet's  forerunner,  had  seen  Pulcheria 
in  her  splendid  progress  to  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  The 
bishops  who  instructed  her  were  those  who  baptized 
Constantino.  And  Constantino  had  discussed  the  faith 
with  men  who  could  have  learned  of  the  Lord's  Supper 
from  those  who  had  partaken  of  it  with  St.  John. 

Twenty  such  lives  as  John's  and  his  disciple  Poly- 
carp's  fill  the  gap  between  Jesus's  ti^je  and  our  own. 

II.  A  true  and  simple  study  of  Christian  history  would 
show  that,  from  the  very  beginning,  the  Gospel  has  been 
always  advancing.  We  speak  of  it,  it  is  true,  in  some 
periods,  as  if  it  were  suffering  a  decline  or  fall.  But  in 
such  events  the  more  accurate  language  is,  that  the 
Gospel  was  then  checked  in  certain  efforts  where  it 
had  succeeded  before ;  and  the  fact  has  always  been, 
that  at  the  same  time  it  was  gaining  in  others.  We 
trust  that  this  is  clear  in  the  chapters  of  this  history. 
When  Paul  and  the  Christians  of  his  time  suffered,  their 
sufferings  were  giving  to  later  times  the  proof  that  what 
they  said  was  true,  —  proof  which  so  much  depends 
upon  to-day.  When  Ignatius  suffered,  he  was  soften- 
ing Trajan's  heart  toward  other  sufferers.  The  perse- 
cution under  Galerius  was  to  call  out  the  sad  decree  of 


CONCLUSION.  261 


toleration  which  he  issued.  The  severest  enemy  the 
faith  ever  met  was,  perhaps,  the  Emperor  Constantine, 
And  yet,  —  to  speak  of  one  result  alone,  —  without  his 
life,  Julian's  must  have  been  different ;  and  we  should 
have  lost  every  testimony  which  in  his  day  was  given. 

Later  down,  it  is  Wickliffe  who  enlightens  Huss,  — 
it  is  Savonarola  who  strengthens  Luther.  The  suffer- 
ings of  one  day  are  not  to  be  compared  with  the  glory 
that  awaits  them  in  another. 

And  so  we  are  taught  to  trust  that  Christian  difficul- 
ties, too  near  our  times  for  our  skilful  study,  shall  bring 
harvests  as  great  in  their  turn.  The  coldness  of  the  last 
century,  and  the  divisions  which  some  persons  dread  in 
this,  have  undoubtedly  had  their  duty,  which  they  have 
performed,  and  which  will  appear  from  day  to  day. 

Jesus  kindled  a  fire.  These  chapters  should  have 
shown  that  it  was  constantly  spreading.  At  first  it 
spread  in  the  number  of  the  converts.  And  for  the  first 
century  or  two  there  was  no  reason  to  doubt  their  sin- 
cerity. There  was  no  motive  to  be  insincere,  when  the 
stake  was  the  prize  or  the  penalty  of  belief.  With  Con- 
stantine, the  faith  spread  over  the  Roman  empire  every- 
where, and  gained  voices  in  high  places.  With  his  suc- 
cessors, it  gained  a  nominal  assent  everywhere.  Per 
haps  it  lost  in  the  number  of  its  sincere  adherents.  No 
one  but  God  can  say.  But  it  gained  access  to  every 
ear  in  Southern  Europe,  in  Western  Asia,  and  in  North- 
ern Africa,  —  that  is,  in  the  middle  of  the  world.  It  is 
not  to  be  presumed,  however,  that  the  myriads  who 
were  baptized  had  a  hearty  personal  sense  of  its  truth. 
And  we  know  that  those  of  intelligence  who  ruled  them 


262  CONCLUSION. 


had  no  sense  of  their  brotherhood.  Nor  was  there 
any  period  afterwards  when  this  could  have  suddenly- 
changed  for  the  better.  But  still,  without  sudden 
change,  by  the  eternal  help  of  God,  who  had  promised 
that  he  would  make  of  Christ's  foes  the  most  loyal  sup- 
porters of  his  throne,  the  gradual  changes  have  been 
wrought  which  have  brought  man  more  and  more  into 
brotherhood  with  man.  Each  century  showed  those 
rising  to  think,  to  pray,  and  to  act  for  themselves,  who, 
a  century  earlier,  were  somebody's  vassals,  or  the 
Pope's  slaves.  Such  a  gradual  change  has  been 
wrought  in  the  great  masses,  which  at  the  first  the 
Church  only  pretended  to  have  converted,  and  the 
world  this  day  shows  more  true  thought  than  ever, 
more  fervent  prayer,  and  more  faithful  action  for  man- 
kind. Far  though  it  be  from  its  goal,  it  is  nearer  a 
Christian  family  of  sons  of  God  than  it  ever  was  before. 

When  some  new  enormity  is  turned  up  to  light  by  the 
quick-eyed  search  of  our  Christianity,  it  should  show  us 
that  our  Christianity  is  sharper-sighted  than  has  been 
that  of  past  ages.  An  abomination  in  the  labor  of 
mines,  a  disgrace  in  the  management  of  fleets,  a  can- 
ker and  open  wound  like  slavery,  are  indications  to  us 
who  see  them  that  we  have  eyes  to  see,  where  former 
generations  went  blindly  on  their  way. 

III.  Indeed,  the  great  lesson  of  all  history,  —  whether 
the  history  of  Christianity  or  the  times  before  Chris- 
tianity,—  is  this,  that  God  never  abandons  the  world. 
There  is  no  event,  however  sad,  from  which,  if  time 
enough  have  followed,  some  result  has  not  come  full  of 
meaning  and  value.     God  permits  none,  from  which  he 


DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 


does  not  draw  such  results,  as  his  kingdom  advances. 
We  are  not  to  look  at  history,  then,  as  if  he  only  inter- 
fered at  certain  terrible  crises  to  save  from  ruin  a  neg- 
lected machine,  whose  disordered  parts  were  crushing 
each  other  in  a  wild  confusion.  He  is  always  in  his- 
tory. Among  the  powers  which  we  call  the  most  mani- 
fest, which  men  court  most  and  speak  of  oftenest,  — 
amons  them  and  beneath  them  all  there  is  the  Greatest 
of  Powers,  the  Will  of  God.  This  makes  good  succeed 
in  the  end.    It  makes  falsehood  contradict  itself  and  fail. 


CHAPTER    XXIX. 

DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 

The  object  of  this  book  is  not  fulfilled,  if  it  does  not 
give  some  help  to  young  people  in  understanding  the 
differences  of  sects  which  they  find  among  Christians, 
as  they  read,  or  in  their  personal  experience.  Most  of 
these  differences  are  the  results  of  historical  causes. 
For  some  of  them,  the  scenes  here  described  will  assign 
the  origin.  This  chapter  is  devoted  to  an  alphabetical 
list  of  those  most  frequently  alluded  to. 

Abyssinian  Christians.     See  Chap.  XVI.  p.  173. 
Albigenses.    Early  Protestants  in  France.    See  p.  177. 
Anabaptists.     See  Baptists. 

Antinomians.     Those  who  conceive  that  the  Spirit  will 
so  direct  them  that  they  need  obey  no  written  law. 


264  DICTIONARY   OF    SECTS. 

Arbienians.  The  Christians  of  Armenia ;  —  who  hold 
relations  with  many  Christians  in  Western  Asia. 
They  have  been  an  independent  church  since  the 
fourth  centuiy. 

Arminian.  The  word  is  used  as  a  theological  term,  to 
describe  any  Christian  of  whatever  sect,  who  holds, 
as  Arminius  did,  a  Dutch  Protestant  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  that  Christ's  sufferings  were  made  a 
reconciliation  for  the  sins  of  all  the  world  (not  mere- 
ly of  certain  elect  persons);  that  true  faith  comes 
from  the  action  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  which,  however, 
does  not  force  men  against  their  own  inclinations ; 
that  then  they  may  persevere,  but  still  may  fall  from 
grace.  In  all  these  points,  they  are  opposed  to  Cal- 
vinists.  The  Arminians  renewed  the  doctrines  of 
Pelagius.     See  p.  104. 

Arnoldists,  named  in  p.  223,  are  those  who  followed 
Arnold  of  Brescia,  a  bold  Italian  Reformer,  who  at- 
tacked the  Pope,  and  was  burned  to  death  in  1155. 

Baptists  are  those  who  hold  that  the  method  of  bap- 
tism by  immersion,  usual  in  early  days  (see  Chap. 
V.  p.  63),  is  an  essential  feature  of  the  rite  of  bap- 
tism ;  that  baptism  should  not  be  administered  to  any 
but  those  who  have  themselves  undergone  such  a  re- 
ligious experience,  that  they  are  sure  they  have  re- 
ceived the  Holy  Spirit ;  and  that  those  thus  baptized 
form  a  visible  church,  to  which  the  authority  of  Jesus 
descends. 

Calvinists,  as  a  denomination,  are  those  European 
Protestants  who  hold  to  the  confession  of  faith  es- 
tablished by  the  celebrated  Reformer,  Calvin.    These 


DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS.  265 

are  perhaps  half  of  the  Protestants  of  the  Continent. 
In  Prussia  the  king  has  lately  attempted,  not  very 
successfully,  to  unite  in  the  "  National  Church  of 
Prussia  "  the  Calvinists  and  Lutherans  in  his  domin- 
ions. 

The  word  is  often  applied  as  a  theological  definition 
to  members  of  other  denominations.  Thus  a  Pres- 
byterian or  an  Episcopalian  is  a  Calvinist,  if  he  hold, 
with  Calvin,  that  men's  lives  are  predestined  ;  that 
God  elects  a  certain  number  who  are  to  be  saved  ; 
that  the  merits  of  Christ  constitute  a  vicarious  atone- 
ment for  the  sins  of  these  elect,  reconciling  God  to 
them  ;  and  that  the  grace  of  God  once  obtained  is 
never  forfeited,  nor  can  be. 

Cathari.     Literally,  the  Pure. 

Catholics.  The  word  generally  means  Roman  Cath- 
olics, —  the  adherents  to  the  supreme  authority,  over 
Christians,  of  the  Pope  or  Bishop  of  Rome.  Catholic 
means  universal ;  —  and  all  Christians  who  feel  that 
the  spirit  of  Jesus  works  in  every  Christian  sect  are 
therefore  catholic  Christians  ;  but  the  word  is  not 
thus  used  as  a  proper  name. 

"  Christians."  There  is  a  body  in  America  who  take 
no  creed  but  the  Bible,  —  no  name  but  the  Christian 
name.  Their  church  discipline  is  purely  Congrega- 
tional.    Their  baptism  is  by  immersion. 

CoNGREGATiONALisTS.     See  Independents. 

CoPTS.     The  Egyptian  Christians. 

Episcopalians,  strictly,  are  those  who  understand  that 
bishops,  ordained  by  other  bishops,  who  were  ordained 
by  others  in  their  time,  receive  thus  peculiar  author- 
No.  VIII.  23 


266  DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 

ity,  descending  from  the  very  times  of  the  Apostles. 
The  word  is  usually  applied  in  America,  however,  to 
the  members  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Churches, 
either  of  England,  Scotland,  or  America. 

When  the  government  of  England,  then  under  King 
Henry  the  Eighth,  accepted  the  general  principles  of 
the  Reformation  (see  Chap.  XXII.),  this  Church,  un- 
der a  form  of  government  partly  connected  with  the 
state,  was  established.  The  theological  doctrines  of 
its  members  vary  more  or  less,  as  men  vary,  and  as 
the  fashions  of  the  times  change,  in  matters  of  theo- 
logical controvei-sy.  But  all  its  officers  subscribe 
"  thirty-nine  articles  "  of  religion,  which  are  the  nom- 
inal standard  of  the  Church.  It  is  not  uncharitable, 
perhaps,  to  say,  that  no  one  holds  them  in  exactly  the 
sense  in  which  they  were  first  held.  Those  members 
of  these  churches  who  hold  with  particular  interest 
to  strict  obedience  to  its  statutes  and  forms,  are  loose- 
ly said  to  be  "  High-Churchmen."  Those  who  look 
with  less  interest  on  these,  sympathizing  more  warm- 
ly with  other  Protestants,  and  making  more  constant 
and  earnest  statement  of  the  necessity  of  "  personal 
religion,"  are  called  "Low  Churchmen,"  Lately, 
the  name  "  Puseyites  or  Tractarians  "  has  been  given 
to  those  who  have  attempted  to  revive  an  interest 
in  observances  and  doctrines  familiar  to  the  English 
Church  when  it  first  separated  from  the  Roman,  but 
since,  in  a  measure,  forgotten. 

Fraticelli,  one  of  the  early  Protestant  bodies. 

Friends.     The  proper  name    of  "  the  people   called 
Quakers."     Nothing  but  the  necessity  of  restricting 


DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS.  267 

the  size  of  this  book  has  compelled  us  to  omit 
the  chapter  in  which  we  had  wished  to  give  an  ac- 
count of  that  true  Reformer,  George  Fox  of  Eng- 
land, with  whom  this  Society  began.  They  have  a 
peculiar  organization,  by  which  they  hope  to  avoid 
the  disadvantages  of  grades  of  ministerial  service. 
They  have  always  "  testified  "  against  "  every  form  of 
idolatry,"  against  war,  oaths,  and  slavery  ;  and  have 
attempted  to  avoid  temptation  to  these  by  the  sim 

■  plicity  of  their  language  and  dress.  They  still  wear 
the  costume  of  the  time  in  which  their  first  preachers 
lived,  feeling  that  any  change  of  fashion  from  defer- 
ence to  the  opinion  of  the  world  is  wrong.  Their 
belief  in  the  frequent  and  perceptible  inward  action 
of  the  Holy  Spirit,  is  their  most  essential  tenet.  It 
marked  them  through  the  dreariness  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  when  half  Christendom  seems  to  have  for- 
gotten that  "  there  was  any  Holy  Ghost."  See 
Chap.  XXVI. 

The  name  "  Quakers  "  was  given  them  in  deris- 
ion, but  it  has  been  so  bravely  worn  that  it  is  now 
an  honor,  and  may  be  used,  without  unkindness,  in 
conversation.  The  names  "  Christian  "  and  "  Puri- 
tan "  were  probably  both  applied  originally  in  scorn, 
in  the  same  manner. 

George  Fox  was  born  in  1624,  and  died  in  1690. 

Greek  Church.  This  Church  has  always  been  inde- 
pendent. It  kept  always  at  variance  with  the  Roman 
Church  on  certain  unintelligible  points,  really  because 
neither  Greek  emperor's  nor  bishops  chose  to  ac- 
knowledge supremacy  out  of  their  own  dominions. 


268  DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 

A  part  of  the  Greek  Church  only  now  regards  the 
Patriarch  at  Constantinople  as  its  head.  The  other 
parts  are  the  Russian,  whose  Patriarch  lives  at  Mos- 
cow ;  and  the  Greeks  of  Greece  proper. 

HiCKSiTES.  A  division  of  the  Quakers  in  America 
bears  this  name. 

Huguenots.  A  name  given  to  the  French  Prot- 
estants. 

Hussites.  The  followers  of  Huss,  of  whom  fragments 
have  subsisted  under  this  name  almost  to  our  time. 
See  Chap.  XVIII. 

Independents.  A  name,  first  general  in  England, 
applied  to  certain  of  the  Puritans,  who  insisted  that 
each  congregation  or  church  has  complete  power  to 
manage  its  own  discipline  and  affairs,  and  to  ordain 
its  own  ministers.  The  settlers  of  Plymouth  and 
Massachusetts  Bay  were  Independents.  Those  at 
Plymouth  had  some  peculiarities  which  gave  them 
the  ignominious  name  of  Brownists.  AH  Congrega- 
tional churches  in  New  England  are  Independents. 

Lutherans.  All  Protestants  who  hold  to  Luther's 
confession  of  faith. 

Methodists.  Christians  who  adhere  to  the  method  of 
church  discipline  and  instruction  established  by  the 
Wesleys  and  sustained  by  Whitefield  a  century  ago. 
Their  revival  of  the  spirit  of  the  Protestant  Church  in 
England  was  very  efficient,  and  came  at  a  time  when 
it  was  greatly  needed.  We  have  regretted  that  the 
limits  of  this  series  have  not  enabled  us  to  dwell 
upon  them.  See  Chap.  III.  p.  46,  and  Chaps.  XXV., 
XXVI. 


DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS  269 

MiLLERiTES.     See  Second  Advent. 

Moravians.  A  community  of  earnest  Evangelical 
Christians,  established  in  its  present  form  by  Count 
Zinzendorf.  Under  the  name  of  the  Bohemian  Breth- 
ren, or  the  Moravian  Brethren,  bodies  of  Christians, 
living  in  the  life  of  a  community,  had  kept  together 
from  the  time  of  Huss.  Zinzendorf  invited  a  num- 
ber of  them,  at  a  time  when  they  were  greatly  broken 
up  by  the  Seven  Years'  War,  to  establish  themselves 
on  an  estate  of  his  in  Lusatia,  where  they  built  their 
town,  Herrnhut.  Different  branches  have  swarmed 
from  this  community,  so  that  now  there  are  nearly 
sixty  thousand  Moravian  brethren  in  different  parts 
of  the  world.  Provision  is  made  for  the  admittance 
of  persons  of  every  creed,  but  as  they  have  none  of 
their  own,  the  distinctions  of  theology  have  quite  died 
out  among  them.  They  have  planted  very  successful 
missions  among  the  Greenlanders  and  Indians. 

Nestorians.  Followers  of  Nestorius,  who  parted  from 
the  Greek  and  Roman  Churches  in  the  fifth  century, 
on  an  incomprehensible  question  on  the  nature  of 
Jesus.  See  Chaps.  IV.,  VI.,  VII.,  XVI.  They  still 
exist  in  Asia. 

New  Church.  The  name  given  to  those  who  receive 
the  revelations  of  Swedenborg  as  inspired,  in  the  way 
in  which  he  thought  them  inspired,  and  join  the  or- 
der of  worship  and  church  government  which  he 
established.  This  church  may  also  be  called  "  the 
Church  of  the  New  Jerusalem."     See  Chap.  XXVI. 

Orthodox  means  "  of  the  true  opinion."  Every  Chris- 
tian hopes  that  he  is  orthodox  himself.  In  New  Eng- 
23* 


270  DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 

land  the  word  is  applied,  generally,  to  distinguish 
those  Protestants  who  are  not  of  the  sect  called 
Christians,  nor  Episcopalians,  nor  Swedenborgians, 
nor  Unitarians,  nor  Universalists. 

Passageni.     One  of  the  ancient  Protestant  bodies. 

Paulicians.  a  body  of  Christians  in  Asia,  pronounced 
heretics  by  the  Roman  and  Greek  Churches.  Some 
of  their  descendants  emigrated  to  Europe,  and  were 
found  among  the  Albigenses,  q.  v. 

Presbyterians  are  so  called  because  they  have  no 
bishops,  but  govern  their  churches  by  presbyteries-and 
synods  of  elders,  meeting  from  time  to  time.  The 
name  relates  to  discipline  only.  Some  Presbyterians 
are  Calvinists,  some  Arminians,  and  some  Unitarians, 
in  theology. 

Quakers.     See  Friends. 

Second  Advent.  A  material  or  physical  explanation 
of  the  figures  of  speech  in  the  Prophecies  of  the  Old 
Testament,  in  the  twenty-fifth  chapter  of  Matthew, 
in  the  Epistles,  and  in  the  Book  of  Revelation, 
has  often  given  rise  to  the  idea  that  Christ  was  to 
come  again  in  person  upon  this  earth,  and  that  its 
destruction  by  fire  would  ensue.  Persons  who  sup- 
pose this  event  near  call  themselves  "  Second  Ad- 
vent Christians."  The  belief  was  general  about  the 
year  1000,  and  at  the  period  of  the  Black  Death.  It 
was  frequently  expressed  in  the  wars  in  England  two 
hundred  years  ago,  and  revived  by  Mr.  Miller's  dis- 
ciples in  America  lately. 

Shakers.  A  small  body,  established  in  England  in 
1747,  but  now  almost  wholly  confined  to  New  Eng- 


DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS.  271 

land.  They  claim  that  they  still  receive  revelations 
of  the  highest  authority  and  importance.  They  pro- 
hibit marriage,  live  in  communities  of  property,  and 
use  a  peculiar  dance  in  their  religious  exercises. 

SwEDENBORGiANS.  This  name  is  frequently  given  to 
members  of  the  New  Church,  q.  v. 

Unitarians.  See  Chaps.  III.,  V.,  and  XXIV.  The 
name  was  first  given  in  Poland,  without  reference  to 
theological  opinion.  In  the  year  1568,  a  decree  was 
confirmed  which  secured  to  all  denominations  of  the 
Reformers  the  free  exercise  of  their  religion.  From 
the  union  of  all  parties  in  passing  this  edict,  a  union 
to  which  they  were  led  by  weighty  reasons,  they  were 
designated  as  Uniti  or  Unitarii.  A  part  of  the  Re- 
formers afterwards  abandoned  the  decree,  and  the 
name  was  restricted  to  those  who  held  to  it,  who 
were  those  who  did  not  believe  the  identity  of  the  Son 
and  the  Father.  As  all  Christians  believe  in  the 
Unity  of  God,  the  q,pplication  of  the  name  to  those 
only  who  do  not  believe  his  Trinity,  though  conven- 
ient, is  not  strictly  philosophical. 

Universalists.  The  name,  as  a  theological  term,  be- 
longs to  all  Christians  who  believe  that  in  the  end 
all  souls  will  be  forgiven  and  happy.  Some  Univer- 
salists suppose  that  this  will  take  place  after  certain 
preparatory  stages  in  another  world.  These  are 
called,  for  convenience,  Restorationists.  The  name 
is  that  of  a  large  religious  organization  in  England 
and  America,  holding  this  fundamental  tenet.  They 
are  strictly  Congregationalist  in  their  church  govern- 
ment. 


272  DICTIONARY    OF    SECTS. 

Waldenses.  Anciently  called  Vallenses.  A  small 
body  of  Protestants  in  the  valleys  of  the  Alps,  who 
have  been  under  their  own  direction  from  the  earli- 
est times. 


QUESTIONS. 


CHAPTER    I. 


What  is  the  close  of  the  book  of  Acts  i 

Why  did  Paul  wish  to  see  Rome  ? 

How  did  he  go  there  at  last  ? 

When  did  he  arrive  1 

Who  was  then  Emperor  ? 

How  had  he  been  trained  to  his  office  ? 

Where  did  Paul  land  1 

What  other  voyage  to  the  same  place  was  made  in  that  spring? 

Describe  the  death  of  Agrippina. 

How  did  Paul  go  to  Rome  1 

How  did  Nero  go,  the  same  summer  ? 

When  was  Paul's  first  trial  ? 

Describe  Seneca's  plans  with  Nero. 

What  was  the  result  of  Paul's  examination  ? 

What,  probably,  did  he  say  to  Nero  and  Seneca  ? 

When  was  his  second  trial  1 

What  was  the  result  of  it  ? 

CHAPTER    II. 

When  were  the  Christians  first  persecuted  by  the  Romans  ? 
What  is  Tacitus's  account  of  that  persecution  ? 
Where  was  Paul  at  that  time  1 
Who  was  Trajan  1 


274  QUESTIONS. 


Describe  his  entrance  into  Eome. 

What  story  does  Dante  tell  of  his  kindness  ? 

"Was  he  under  Christian  influences  ? 

Describe  the  death  of  Simeon. 

On  what  charge  were  the  Christians  found  guilty  1 

Wliat  was  Trajan's  objection  to  their  meeting  1 

Who  was  Pliny  1 

Give  some  account  of  his  letter  to  Trajan  ftbout  the  Chrisiians. 

What  did  Trajan  reply? 

Who  was  Ignatius  1 

Where  was  he  tried  and  sentenced  1 

How  was  the  sentence  executed  ? 

What  was  the  result  of  such  executions  1 


CHAPTEK    III. 

What  was  the  early  condition  of  Christianity  in  Asia? 

What  causes  helped  its  exteasion  there  1 

Where  and  when  was  Montanus  born  1 

How  did  he  become  a  Christian  ? 

What  Avere  his  first  Christian  efforts  ? 

What  views  did  he  press  ? 

Who  were  his  first  converts  ? 

What  opposition  did  they  meet? 

What  was  the  success  of  Montanism  ? 

With  what  signs  was  it  accompanied  ? 

What  part  did  different  bishops  take  in  it  ? 

What  movements  like  this  have  there  been  since  ? 

Who  were  Emperors  of  Rome  in  Montanus's  time  ? 

How  did  they  treat  the  Christians  ? 

What  was  the  chief  seat  of  Christian  learning  ? 

What  is  said  of  Mark's  Gospel  ?  , 

Who  was  Clement  ? 

CHAPTER    IV. 

What  was  Origen's  home  ? 
How  did  his  father  die  ? 


QUESTIONS.  275 


Where  did  Origen  go  1 

What  important  duty  was  intrusted  to  him  1 

What  schools  were  there  in  his  time  in  the  city  of  Alexandria  "? 

Give  some  account  of  Egyptian  speculations. 

How  did  they  represent  these  views  to  the  people  1 

What  other  philosophers  had  views  somewhat  similar  ? 

How  did  the  Christians  generally  receive  these  speculations  1 

What  did  they  teach  of  the  invisibility  of  God  ? 

Give  an  account  of  Minucius  Pelix's  argument. 

What  did  they  say  af  Christ's  nature  generally  ? 

Who  were  Gnostics  ?  * 

What  did  Origen  and  Clement  say  of  Gnostics  ? 

How  was  Christian  doctrine  affected  by  other  doctrines  around  it  ? 

What  view  of  theirs  is  repeated  1 

What  hymn  closes  the  chapter  ? 

CHAPTER    V. 

Where  is  Numidia  ? 
When  was  Mary  of  Numidia  born  1 
What  was  the  ceremony  of  baptism  at  that  time  ? 
What  were  the  religious  services  at  home  ? 
What  were  the  hours  for  the  public  religious  services  ? 
What  was  the  order  of  these  services  1 

What  lessons  were  the  younger  people  expected  to  learn  before 
their  baptism  ? 

What  was  the  service  of  the  Communion  ? 
What  was  the  form  of  marriage  at  that  time  ? 
To  what  office  was  Mary's  son  appointed  1 
What  was  his  fate  1 


CHAPTER    VI. 

Where  and  when  was  Constantino  born  ? 
What  was  his  education  ? 
Wliat  was  his  fortune  in  the  army  1 
How  did  Diocletian  treat  him  ? 
Why  did  Galerius  expose  him  1 


276  QUESTIONS. 


How  did  he  escape  to  his  father  1 

"Where  and  how  was  he  made  "  Augustus  "  ? 

What  was  th<,  oeginning  of  the  persecution  then  raging  * 

How  did  the  Emperors  attempt  to  destroy  Christianity? 

Did  the  Church  suffer  permanent  injury? 

How  did  Constantine  execute  the  decree  against  Chi-istians  ? 

When  and  why  was  it  recalled  ? 

Who  was  Maxentius  1 

Describe  Constantine's  campaign  against  him. 

What  is  the  story  of  the  appearance  of  the  cross  in  the  sky  ? 

What  was  the  Labarum  ? 

Did  Constantine  profess  Christianity  when  he  became  Emperor  ? 

How  did  he  treat  the  Christians  1 

How  did  the  bishops  treat  him  ? 

What  was  his  decree  about  Sunday  ? 

What  were  some  of  his  cruelties  1 

What  questions  were  left  to  him  to  decide  ? 

Who  was  Arius  1 

Who  was  Athanasius  1 

Describe  Constantine's  baptism  and  death. 

"What  effect  on  Christianity  had  his  reign  ? 

CHAPTER    VII. 

What  relation  to  Constantine  did  Julian  bear  ? 
How  old  was  he  when  Constantine  died  1 
What  were  his  early  experiences  of  the  Emperor's  cruelty  1 
Who  was  his  brother? 
Who  had  the  charge  of  their  education  1 

Julian  was  trained  in  two  forms  of  religion.    How  did  this 
happen  1 

What  office  in  the  church  did  he  fill  1 
How  did  Constantius  treat  him  ? 
Whom  did  he  find  in  Nicomedia  ? 
How  did  he  come  to  study  magic  1 
What  god  did  he  select  as  his  own  ? 
Describe  the  vision  which  led  to  this. 
"What  was  his  life  in  Gaul  1 


QUESTIONS.  277 


How  did  he  become  "  Augustus  "  1 

When  did  he  give  up  Christianity'? 

What  directions  did  he  give  at  Constantinople  1 

How  did  the  army  receive  his  rehgious  schemes  1 

Describe  the  feast  of  Apollo  at  Antioch. 

What  enterprise  did  he  attempt  at  Jerusalem  1 

How  did  he  die  ? 

Who  was  the  next  Emperor  1 

Had  the  Christians  suffered  personally  under  him  ? 

Does  his  history  show  that  the  mass  of  people  were  Christians  1 

Does  it  show  that  they  were  attached  to  the  heathen  worship  1 

What  does  it  show  of  those  who  were  Christians  1 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

Into  what  distant  countries  did  the  Apostles  penetrate  1 
Why  is  the  history  of  their  travels  confined  to  the  Roman  Empire? 
What  was  the  Christianity  of  the  Goths  ? 
Who  was  the  Emperor  of  the  West  at  this  period  1 
Who  was  Alaric  ? 

What  is  the  date  of  his  entrance  into  Rome  ? 
What  was  the  state  of  Christianity  in  Rome  ? 
Who  was  Augustine,  and  where  was  he  born  ? 
How  was  he  educated  through  his  boyhood  1 
What  was  his  behaviour  at  school  1 
Where  did  he  go  on  leaving  school  ? 
What  was  it  that  impressed  him  at  nineteen  years  of  age  ? 
Who  were  the  Manicheans  ? 

Where  did  Augustine  go,  and  what  was  liis  office  ? 
Describe  the  manner  of  his  conversion  from  his  evil  way  ? 
What  course  of  life  did  he  follow  1 
Who  was  Pelagius  1 
What  is  the  meaning  of  his  name  ? 
What  were  the  opinions  of  Augustine  ? 
What,  those  of  Pelagius  1 
What  was  the  result  of  their  controversy  1 
What  coincidence  can  be  observed  in  studying  the  course  of  this 
controversy  1 

NO.  VITI.  24 


278  QUESTIONS. 


CHAPTER    IX. 

"What  was  the  quality  of  the  Christianity  at  court  in  the  West- 
em  Empire? 

"Who  was  Pulcheria  1 

How  old  was  she  when  she  was  called  upon  to  act  as  a  heroine  1 

"What  was  her  character  1 

"What  was  her  position  1 

"What  sort  of  a  person  was  Theodosius  1 

How  did  he  spend  his  time  1 

How  did  he  use  his  imperial  power  1 

"What  vow  did  Pulcheria  make,  and  how  did  she  render  it  more 
solemn  ? 

How  did  she  and  her  sisters  pass  their  time  1 

"What  title  did  she  bear  1 

How  did  Pulcheria  use  her  power  ? 

Who  was  Athenais  1 

Relate  her  life  and  her  troubles. 

What  befell  her  on  her  father's  death  ? 

Where  did  she  go  ? 

How  was  she  received  1 

How  did  the  Emperor  first  meet  her? 

What  new  name  did  Athenais  take  ? 

How  did  she  employ  herself? 

What  was  Theodosius's  worst  fault  1 

How  did  he  receive  his  sister's  lesson  for  it  1 

Did  the  Empress  govern  the  country  Avitli  prudence  ? 

How  was  Pulcheria  made  Empress  ? 

What  was  her  death  ? 


CHAPTER    X. 

What  was  the  religion  at  the  Caaba  in  Mecca  ? 
In  the  story  of  the  four  truth-seekers,  what  were  they  seeking  ? 
What  was   Waraca's    success  ?      Othman's  ?      Obeydallah's  ? 
Zeyd's  1 

Hew  eld  was  Mahomet  whan  he  annoui-ccd  himself  as  a  prophet  r 


QUESTIONS.  279 


What  was  the  disposition  of  the  people  of  Mecca  ? 

How  did  his  wife  receive  his  revelation  1 

Who  were  his  first  converts  ? 

How  did  they  succeed  in  Mecca  ? 

What  is  the  Hegira  ? 

What  was  Mahomet's  success  afterwards  ? 

Describe  his  death. 

What  conquests  did  his  followers  make  ? 

What  were  the  causes  of  their  rapid  triumphs  ? 

Had  the  Mussulman  soldiers  as  firm  faith  as  Mahomet  1 

What  firm  conviction  had  they,  and  on  what  foundation  1 

CHAPTER    XI. 

How  was  Clovis  converted  1 
What  did  he  say  of  the  crucifixion  ? 
Who  governed  France  in  those  days  ? 
Who  was  Leger  ? 
Where  did  he  study  when  young  1 
Of  what  city  was  he  afterwards  bishop  ? 
Who  were  the  do-nothing  kings  ? 
Why  did  they  do  nothing  1 
Describe  Dagobert's  funeral. 

Relate  the  scene  at  Easter  between  the  king  and  bishop  ? 
What  happened  to  Leger  afterwards  ? 
What  sign  of  evil  was  observed  in  these  times  ? 
Describe  the  attack  on  Autun. 

Relate  the  miracle  by  which  the  barbarian  is  said  to  have  been 
punished. 

How  was  Leger  killed  ? 

What  resulted  to  Christianity  from  such  conversions  ? 

CHAPTER    XII. 

How  was  Great  Britain  divided  at  the  time  of  Alfred  1 

What  was  the  condition  of  England  ? 

Who  was  Claudia,  and  by  Avhom  is  she  alluded  to  ? 

Hov/  could  Christianity  have  been  introduced  into  Great  Britain  ? 


280  QUESTIONS. 


Who  were  the  Vikings  1 

How  old  was  the  prince  Alfred  when  he  learned  to  read  1 

What  first  led  him  to  learn  1 

After  he  was  made  king,  how  was  he  obliged  to  occupy  himself? 

What  did  he  force  his  old  soldiers  to  do,  in  time  of  peace  1 

How  did  he  then  employ  himself? 

What  was  his  success  in  governing  ? 

Was  he  a  Christian  king "? 

What  was  the  Christianity  of  the  priests  and  peasants  ? 

What  has  survived  of  the  characteristics  belonging  to  them,  that 
has  served  to  make  their  descendants  free  inquirers  ? 

What  five  causes  are  stated  as  having  produced  the  present  state 
of  Protestant  Christianity  in  England  1 

CHAPTER    XIII. 

When  was  Hildebrand  born  1 

Who  was  he  1 

What  was  the  custom  with  regard  to  the  appointment  of  the 
Pope? 

Who  had  been  appointed  Pope  at  this  time,  and  by  whom  1 

What  was  the  advice  of  Hildebrand  to  the  Pope  1 

How  did  he  leave  Cluny  for  Rome  1 

How  was  the  Pope  received  at  Rome  1 

How  long  did  he  reign  ? 

How  great  was  the  influence  of  Hildebrand  ? 

What  reforms  did  he  attempt  among  the  clergy  1 

What  is  simony  1 

Eind  the  passage  in  Acts  alluded  to. 

Repeat  the  account  of  the  investigation  made  concerning  the 
French  archbishop. 

What  Avas  the  result  of  this  incident? 

What  title  did  Hildebrand  hold  ? 

What  office  did  he  finally  assume,  and  under  what  name  ? 

What  declarations  did  he  make  of  his  power  ? 

How  were  these  received  by  the  royal  powers  1 

What  answer  did  the  Emperor  Henry  make  to  a  threat  of  ex- 
communication 1 


QUESTIONS.  281 


What  was  the  reply  of  the  Pope "? 
What  effect  had  this  upon  Henry  ? 
Give  an  account  of  his  going  to  the  Pope,  and  reception. 
What  was  the  end  of  the  Pope  ? 

What  were  his  last  words,  and  the  reply  of  the  bishop  ? 
What  influences  did  he  leave  behind  him  1 
Por  how  long  was  this  observable  1 

What  is  the  state  of  things  now,  with  regard  to  the  Papal 
power  1 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

Did  the  Crusades  advance  civilization  ? 

Did  the  Popes  favor  them  1 

Who  led  the  third  Crusade,  for  the  recovery  of  Jerusalem? 

Where  did  the  English  land  ? 

Describe  one  of  the  sieges. 

How  were  the  Saracens  converted  ? 

Why  were  the  hostages  hung  ? 

What  custom  is  described  at  encamping  ? 

What  was  the  "Easter  miracle  "? 

What  account  is  given  of  a  fraud  by  which  it  was  wrought? 

How  was  a  piece  of  the  Holy  Cross  found  1 

How  did  Richard  take  Joppa  1 

What  was  the  end  of  the  campaign  ? 

How  did  the  Crusades  affect  the  nations  of  Asia? 

What  spirit  did  they  nourish  in  Europe  1 

Did  they  strengthen  the  Popes  ? 

What  benefit  did  they  introduce  into  Europe  ? 


CHAPTER     XV. 

Why  does  history  tell  so  little  of  the  people  in  the  Dark  Ao-eg  ? 

What  was  the  condition  of  laboring  men  ?  '^ 

What  Avas  a  vassal's  oath  1 

What  was  the  people's  influence  ? 

Describe  Gurth's  dress  and  badge. 

Desrvihp  the  rnni--i^^'  rUn]\n^  ^yjf}^  ^i^pj,,  ^^^.^^^ 


282  QUESTIONS. 


What  was  repselver  ? 

How  was  it  paid  in  the  instance  given  ? 

Where,  now,  does  one  person  plan  for  another's  action  1 

Describe  the  settlement  of  California. 

What  was  the  state  of  the  Indians  1 

How  did  they  prosper"? 

How  did  this  end  1 

What  other  system  of  labor  is  contrasted  with  this  ? 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

Did  the  Church  of  Rome  ever  embrace  all  Christians  ? 
What  Eastern  and  African  churches  are  named  1 
Why  had  the  Roman  Church  most  power  in  the  West  ? 
What  was  the  intercourse  between  distant  regions  and  Rome  ? 
How  did  they  receive  the  Pope's  commands  1 
What  was  King  John's  agreement  1 
How  long  did  it  last  1 

Were  there  ever  religious  controversies  in  early  times  1 
What  is  a  Pi-otestant  1 
How  early  were  there  Protestants  ? 
Where  were  they  1 
Who  were  the  Albigenses  ? 
Describe  the  trial  of  two  heretics. 
Describe  the  capture  of  Lavaur. 

How  did  they  distinguish  Catholics  from  heretics  at  Bexiers  1 
What  was  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  the  country  of  the  Albi- 
genses afterwards  1 

CHAPTER   XVII. 

The  Black  Death  began  in  1348.  Where  did  it  come  from 
upon  Europe  ? 

Describe  its  progress. 

How  long  did  its  havoc  in  one  country  continue  1 

What  was  the  extent  of  its  ravages,  as  shown  by  the  number  of 
deaths  1 

What  charges  were  made  against  the  Jews  1 


QUESTIONS.  283 


Who  accused  them  unjustly  ? 

What  conduct  of  the  Senate  of  Strasburg  is  described  1 

What  was  the  "  real  poison  "  which  killed  the  Jews  1 

How  did  Europe  recover  from  the  plague  1 

What  was  its  result  1 

How  did  it  affect  property  ? 

How  did  the  monks  behave,  and  how  were  they  affected  1 

Who  were  the  Flagellants  ? 

What  effect  was  produced  on  the  Pope's  power? 

How  did  it  affect  labor,  and  the  laboring  people  1 

CHAPTER   XVIII. 

Where  was  Wickliflf}  at  the  time  of  the  Black  Death  ? 

What  did  he  think  it  1 

What  book  did  he  then  write  1 

How  did  he  treat  the  Church  of  Rome  and  the  friars  1 

What  did  he  always  say  of  the  Scriptures  1 

What  of  the  right  of  the  human  soul  1 

How  did  the  Popes,  and  how  did  England,  receive  his  doctrine  1 

What  is  the  spirit  of  the  passages  quoted  from  his  sermons  ? 

Repeat  some  passage  of  his  version  of  the  Bible. 

What  did  the  Council  of  Constance  do  with  Wickliffe's  body  1 

What  was  the  Council  of  Constance  1 

What  did  they  do  with  the  Popes  1 

Who  was  John  Huss  1 

How  did  the  Pope  treat  him  1  and  how  did  the  Emperor  and 
the  Council  ? 

On  what  charges  was  he  tried  ? 

What  was  his  sentence  1 

Describe  his  execution,  and  Leutze's  picture  of  it. 

What  is  said  of  Jerome  of  Prague  1  and  what  of  other  early 
Protestants  1 

What  effect  had  the  invention  of  printing  1 


284  QUESTIONS. 


CHAPTEK  XIX. 

What  new  phrase  was  in  Pope  Clement's  indulgences  "^ 

Where  was  Girolamo  Savonarola  born  ? 

How  did  he  enter  his  manhood  1 

What  did  he  write  to  his  father  ? 

What  reasons  had  he  for  being  a  monk  1 

How  did  the  convent  satisfy  him  1 

What  poem  did  he  write  1 

Describe  his  first  preaching. 

What  effect  did  his  preaching  on  the  Apocalypse  produce  1 

In  what  condition  was  Florence  1 

How  did  Savonarola  and  Lorenzo  meet  each  other  ? 

What  parties  rose  in  Florence  1 

Describe  the  scene  at  Lorenzo's  death. 

For  what  did  Savonarola  ask  a  council  1 

What  act  brought  about  his  fall  1 

Describe  the  ordeal  by  fire. 

Describe  Savonarola's  death. 

CHAPTER    XX. 

How  had  most  men  received  religious  or  mental  instruction  be- 
fore the  invention  of  printing  1 

What  is  the  earliest  Christian  poetry  ? 

In  which  Gospel  are  the  earliest  Christian  hymns  1 

What  hymns  are  spoken  of  after  the  death  of  Christ  1 

What  is  the  origin  of  the  tune  of  Old  Hundred  ? 

What  fragments  of  hymns  are  in  the  Epistles  ? 

What  is  the  earliest  emblem  of  God  ? 

Wliat  later  ones  are  used  'i 

What  profess  to  be  the  first  pictures  of  Jesus  t 

What  Avas  the  handkerchief  preserved  at  Edessa  ? 

What  was  the  early  statement  as  to  his  appearance  ? 

What  is  Augustine's  1 

What  are  the  earliest  images  of  him  ? 

What  is  the  first  medal  1 


QUESTIONS,  285 


What  are  the  earliest  pictures  at  Rome  ? 

What  resemblances  are  found  to  the  cross  ? 

Why  are  the  lamb,  the  shepherd,  the  fish,  and  the  pelican,  em- 
blems of  Christ  ? 

Why  are  the  dove,  and  tongues  of  fire,  emblems  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  ? 

When  are  white  robes  used  in  Christian  churches  ? 

What  is  denoted  by  the  anchor  1  the  cock  ?  the  stag  1  the 
horse  ?  the  lion  ?  the  hare  ?  and  the  phoenix  1 

Why  are  eggs  emblems  of  Easter  ? 

What  are  the  emblems  in  the  passion-flower  ? 

What  is  the  Glory  1 

What  are  the  Amice  1  the  Alb  ?  the  Girdle,  Maniple,  and 
Stole  1  the  Chasuble  1 

What  does  the  priest's  tonsure  represent? 

What  suggests  the  form  of  the  Catholic  altars  ?  What  the  light 
above  them  1 

Repeat  some  of  the  inscriptions  in  the  Catacombs. 

When  was  Christian  art  at  its  highest  point  ? 

CHAPTER    XXI. 

In  what  view  is  America  a  gift  of  Christianity  to  the  world  1 
What  motive  had  Columbus  for  his  last  voyage  1 
What  colony  did  he  plant  in  it  ? 
What  troubles  befell  him  there  1 
Desci-ibe  his  vision. 
How  did  the  colony  succeed  1 
How  was  the  Pacific  Ocean  discovered  1 
Has  it  been  a  pacific  ocean  ? 
Describe  Balboa's  march. 
Describe  his  first  view  of  the  South  Sea. 
What  motives  led  the  first  adventurers  from  Spain  1 
What  is  the  present  condition  in  religious  faith  of  the  Indians  of 
the  regions  which  they  discovered  ? 


286  QUESTIONS. 


CHAPTER   XXII. 

What  is  "  the  greatest  scene  in  modem  history  "  ? 
How  long  had  Luther  been  preaching  reform  when  he  was  sum- 
moned to  the  city  of  Worms  1 

Who  was  the  Cardinal  Alexander  ? 

How  had  the  Pope  treated  Luther  1 

Describe  the  service  of  blessing  and  cursing  at  Rome. 

What  did  the  cardinal  ask  of  the  Emperor  1 

How  did  the  Emperor  summon  Luther  1 

How  were  circumstances  changed  since  Huss's  time  ? 

How  did  Luther  regard  Savonarola's  picture  1 

How  did  he  enter  Worms  1 

Describe  the  first  day  after  his  arrival. 

Describe  the  second. 

How  did  the  Assembly  receive  his  resolution  1 

What  did  the  Emperor  say  1 

What  token  did  the  Duke  of  Brunswick  send  him  1 

What  was  the  Emperors  decision  1 

Where  did  Luther  go  1 

CHAPTER    XXIII. 

Who  was  Ignatius  Loyola  ? 

What  is  the  story  of  his  vow  to  the  Virgin  Mary  ? 

How  did  the  Inquisition  treat  him  1 

What  did  he  at  Paris  1 

What  is  the  organization  of  the  Society  of  Jesus  1 

What  has  it  done  1 

How  has  it  affected  the  Catholic  world  1 

Who  was  Xavier  ? 

Describe  his  first  efforts  in  Japan. 

How  did  his  first  preaching  succeed  ? 

What  was  the  result  of  his  journey  to  the  capital  ? 

How  did  he  address  the  king  of  Amungutium  on  his  return  1 

How  successful  was  he  there  as  a  "  fisher  of  men  "  ? 

Where  and  how  did  he  die  ? 

What  became  of  the  Jesuit  power  in  Japan;? 


QUESTIONS.  287 


CHAPTER    XXIV. 

Why  was  Poland  a  country  of  Unitarians  ? 
What  had  been  their  fVite  elsewhere  ? 
When  did  Ruarus  go  there  1 
What  position  was  offered  him  in  England  ? 
How  did  his  father  and  mother  regard  his  faith  1 
What  does  he  say  of  the  charge  of  heresy  ? 
What  was  the  fate  of  the  Polish  Unitarians  ? 
Where  are  their  descendants  now  1 

What  are  Ruarus 's  seven  reasons  why  the  Church  of  Rome 
should  sympathize  with  them  1 

What  service  did  they  render  to  all  Christendom  1 

CHAPTER   XXV. 

What  was  the  family  of  Cotton  Mather  1 

Who  was  he  named  for  1 

How  was  he  educated  1 

What  was  the  fundamental  principle  of  the  New  England 
churches  1 

What  change  had  been  wrought  in  this  1 

What  change  in  them  1 

How  did  Cotton  Mather's  preaching  differ  from  the  older 
Puritans'  1 

Describe  the  title  of  his  sermon  on  Thunder. 

What  is  his  account  of  it  ? 

What  spirit  does  this  sermon  show  1 

Where  is  the  same  spirit  found  in  other  matters  ? 

What  event  put  an  end  to  the  influences  of  such  a  state  of  so- 
ciety in  New  England  1 

CHAPTER  XXVI. 

What  was  the  spirit  of  the  religion  of  England  a  hundred  years 
ago  ? 

What  effect  had  the  Wesleys  and  Whitefield  1 


288  QUESTIONS. 


What  influence  had  other  philanthropists  in  England  ? 
What  were  Swedenborg's  first  studies  ? 
To  what  did  they  lead  him  ? 
Describe  the  first  demonstration  of  his  revelation. 
What  did  he  believe  this  to  be  1 

How  does  he  say  his  entrance  into  the  spiritual  world  diflFers 
from  that  of  other  men  ? 

What  is  said  of  the  origin  of  his  state  1 
How  do  Christians  regard  his  revelations  1 
What  is  said  of  his  disciples  1 

CHAPTER    XXVII. 

Describe  Wallis's  discovery  of  Tahiti. 
When  and  why  did  Cook  visit  that  island  ? 
What  offer  did  Otoo  make  to  him  ? 
How  did  he  receive  it  ? 

When  did  the  English  efforts  to  convert  Tahiti  begin  ? 
How  were  the  missionaries  met  ? 
Wliat  were  their  first  failures  1 
How  did  the  natives  treat  them  ? 
When  were  they  driven  away  1 
How  did  they  return  ? 
What  was  the  king's  condition  ? 
How  did  their  success  begin  1 

And  how  was  Christianity  permanently  established  there  ? 
What  form  of  effort  has  sprung  up  from  the  success  of  Mission- 
ary Societies'? 


It  is  hoped  that  Chapters  XXVIII.  and  XXIX.  will  suggest 
their  own  questions  to  teacher  and  learner. 


13694YB   18l£ 

12-12-02  32180      HS  I 


Princeton  Theoloqical ,  Seminary  L-ibraries 


1012  01292  2177 


